
Book. 



1^4fe 



THE YxlHOO 



SATIRICAL RHAPSODY 



VELIJTI TN SPECULUM. 



From what I have gathered from your own relation," said the king," 
ad the answers I have, with much pains, wringed and extorted from 
I, I cannot but conclude the bulk of your natives to be the most 

nicious race of little, odious vermin, that Nature ever suffered to 
wl upon the surface of the earth." — Gulliver's Travels: 

' My horror and astonishment are not to be described, when I ob- 
ved in this abominable animal'^ perfect huruan figure." — Ibid. 

' Where knaves and fool? combingd o'er all prevail." — Byron. 



NEW-YORK; 

PUBLISHED BY G. VALE, 3 FRANKLIN SQUARE. 



1846. 






assi 



■y 



PREFACE 



BY THE AMERICAN PUBLISHER. 



This work first appeared in England, without name, per- 

s because some of the allusions might be there consid- 

l personal, and libellous. It was republished, in parts, 

rhe Comet, a periodical long since out of print. A few 

ies were also for sale in octavo form, decently bound, 

at a high price. These also have disappeared; and 

.. ^ny remain, they will be sought after for the library, by 

those who wish to keep it in that form. 

The object of the poem is to ridicule the vices and fol- 
lies of mankind, especially those of pride, oppression, hy- 
pocrisy, or superstition ; and its tendency is, consequently, 
to elevate society ; while its merits as a poem, and its wit, 
are calculated to secure it a hearing, at the same time, the 
ilosophy, the learning, and the information amassed in 
notes, must afford solid food for those who profess to 
ve no appetite for poetry. 

Our object in reprinting it, is, not only to give it to the 
blic, who are now deprived of it, but to give it in a cheap 
m, so that it may come within the reach of thousands 
10 would otherwise never see it. g. v. 



FREAMLBIiE. 



"O world! buzzard world ! when wilt thou come out of thine in- 
fancy, and assume a beard, and a mind worthy of that beard ! Learn 
to despise long coats; reject thy leaders and leading strings; stau . 
upon thine own legs; be of age ; look round thee, and distingui.-, 
truth and freedom from restraint and disguises." — Dissertation up y. 
Old Women. 



Thus apostrophized Thomas Gordon, a century ago ; a 
can we pronounce the ' Buzzard ' to be much wiser at pi 
sent, and in a condition to cast off its leading strings a 
long coats ; or (to continue the metaphor) able to dispen 
with its go-cart and slavering-bib ! That the world is ve 
silly, considering its age, has been observed long sine 
which, however, is not much to be wondered at, when > 
recollect what great care is taken to' perpetuate ignorant 
and eradicate from the mind of youth every natural and ; 
tional idea, and to substitute in lieu the most nonsensi« 
and stupifying metaphysical jargon, by which the mi 
becomes so contaminated,* that, under the name of religi< 
the horrible and cannibal idea of eating and drinking t 
' body and blood' of the deity they worship,! and to wh( 



* " Sa conception etait d'autant plus vive et plus nette, que son 
faiice n'ayant point ete chargee des inutilites et des sotiises qui ac 
blent la notre, les choses entraient dans sa cervelle sans nuage 
N'ayant rein appris dans son enfance, il n'avait point appris de j 
juges. Son eniendement n'ayant point ete curbe par I'erreur e 
demeure dans tout sa rectitude. II voyait les choses comme elle s( 
an lieu que les idees qu'on nous donne dans I'enfance nous les f 
voir toute notre vie comme elles ne sont point." — Ulngenu. 

I " And here we drink our Saviour's blood." — Watfs Hymns. 1 
is pretended to be only typical, &c. ; but even when consideret 
that light, the bare idea is enough to put a Cherokee or a Hottenlo 
the blush, as the very quintescence of cannibalism. 



PREAMBLE. V 

tliey address their supplications, so far from exciting horror, 
is set down as the first and most important duty of a Chris- 
tian Yahoo ! 

We now live in an enlightened age ! — what a consoling 
and heart-warming consideration ! — where the intellect is 
spread out like an apothecary's plaster, and the mind mar- 
ches on with the strides of a Captain Bobadil, or Major 
Sturgeon ; and every poor scribbler is sufficiently enlight- 
ened to know that if he wishes for pudding or praise, or is 
desirous of eating apple tarts and cream with the maids of 
honor, or venison and custard with the Lord Mayor, he 
must glide quietly on with the stream, and be careful how- 
he hints, in the most remote manner, at the folly and vices 
of the Corinthian order. 

The most distant allusion to their depravity will be deem- 
ed jacobinism; the slightest observations on the damning 
creed of Athanasius, blasphemy and atheism, and rational 
remarks on the so much admired fustian in heroics*, or 
cat-lap namby-pamby of " Peter and his Ass," will stamp 
him a low lived Goth, and totally disqualify him for ever 
associating with the be-whiskered dandies and painted dolls 
in high life. All he could then expect would be the re- 
ward of the poor poet, as described by Pope — a garret with 
broken windows, and half a peck of coals ; or to be admit- 
ted as a member of Foote's squad of scribblers, and start 
fair with them for a mess of milk porridge at breakfast 
time. 

Reading Public, (to adopt the fashionalDle slang, but who 
seem to read to little purpose,) ten thousand pens are worn 
and wearing to the stumps, working day and night in pro- 

* See the " Ode on the Battle of Waterloo," where Carnage is 
'*■ God's daughter," among other instances of the sublime and beauti- 
ful ; and poor Peter's donkey's brotherly three groans, in the slop-daw- 
dle way; with "Betty Foy," the " toothless mastiff bitch," &c. &c., 
all of which, after being properly daubed over hy learned andimpartial 
reviewers, were purchased with avidity by an intelligent reading pub- 
lie, to their great edification and delight. 

A lady who was purchasing a eollection of books, asked Dr. Johnson 
whether she should be guided in the selection by the reviews. " By 
all means, madam," replied the doctor, " they will serve you as an in^^ 
fallible guide ; purchase ail that they revile, but none that they nraise, 
and you will be sure to be right."— Co/ton's Hypocrisy. 

*1 



VI PREAMBLE. 

curing wherewithal to glut thy insatiate and ravenous maw,* 
andj with a very few exceptions, with the same sort of 
mawkish stuff; one scribbler following another in the same 
dull beaten track, like horses in a team, as Parson Hicker- 
ingill observest — " one's nose in t'other's tail," all singing 
to the same tune ; the parrot-like gabble, and the cuckoo's 
dull note ; everlastingly bellowing forth in praise of the 
" powers that be ;" blarneying with fulsome panegyric the 
' best of kings ;'j: an illustrious nobility ;§ the pure and sa- 
pient Collective ;|| the glorious Constitution ; with the ne- 
ver-enough-to-be-praised British nation, as preeminent in 



* The many-headed beast is a foul feeder," says Dr. Southey, and 
tlie doctor is very right, as appears by its feeding on such filthy food 
as Lot and hia daughters ; 'ZekeVs buttered bun ; and the two Brims, 
whose 'teats of virginity were bruised," &c. (Ezekiel xxxiii.) besides 
gorging every Lord's day on the bloody sweat of the Lamb. 

Now let us suppose a Lord Fopdoodle, or a Sir Dilberry Diddle, 
who had hurried to be in time at a grand dinner party of Corinthians 
of the highest class, should arrive in a state of perspiration, wiping his 
phiz, and exclaiming that he was in a " bloody sweat," what a con- 
sternation and turning up of eyes it would occasion ! with the stamp 
of downright blackguard on his character for ever after. 

t " Pillars of Priestcraft," 

t Yes ! and as wise as good ! — See P. Pindar's account of the royal 
dead mutton sent to Fleet market foi sale ! and of the more than Paul 
Pry curiosity to discover the seam in the apple dumpling; with other 
Solomon-like specimens of profound sagacity, in the late money scrap- 
ing, church going Sheepyo Americanus. 

§ Titles were offered to the leading members of Congress, as a lure, 
during the American war; in answer to which Dr. Franklin replies — 
<' Peerages ! Alas, sir! our long observation of the vast servile ma- 
jority of your peers voting constantly for every measure proposed by 
a minister, however weak or wicked, leaves us little respect for them." 
— Franldin\s Correspondence. 

11 A parliament of knaves and sots, 

CMembers by name you must not mention,) 
He keeps in pay, and buys their votes. 
With here a place, and there a pension. 

Lord Rochester. 
" You will receive herewith," says Frederick IL in a letter to D'- 
Alembert, during the American war, "the remedy which you request 
for the hydrophobia, or bite of mad dogs. The medicine has perform- 
ed wonderful cures, and I would recommend that it be sent to the Eng- 
lish Parliament ; it's members act like a legion of lunatics." — Belshmn's 
History of England. 



PREAMBLE. VU 

virtue, courage, humanity,* charity, and every other good 
quality : every third page of their luminous productions 
larded (like a round of beef with gobbets of fat bacon) with 
' the Lord's goodness,' the ' blessing of Heaven, Divine 
Providence, a precious Redeemer, the Most High, &c. &c. 
not forgetting the ' inestimable treasure of the Holy Scrip- 
tures, which excelleth all the treasures of the earth,' (as the 
translators of the Jew book told the brutish Solomon in 
their dedication,) with other fear-the-lord gibberish, of a 
similar quality. 

* British Humanity is the eternal cry with which we are deafened ; 
and, indeed, whenever a subscription has been set on foot for the poor 
Dutch, poor Swiss, distressed Germans, or other foreigners, with a 
recommendation from royally, a considerable sum has always been 
raised : but when four or five hundred poor creatures, their own dear 
Britons, were cut to pieces, and trampled under the iron hoofs of hor- 
ses, indiscriminately, men, women and children, by infuriated, half 
drunken savages, who had their sabres sharpened expressly for the 
butchery, and the distress and horror it nught have been supposed 
would have excited general compassion among a people self styled the 
very quintescence of humanity, and the true Christian milk of human 
kindness; but no, a yell of barbarous exultation was set up ; and a cry 
of ' serve'em right,' was heard from Cornwall to the Orkney Islands, 
among the ^enieeZ classes of toad-eaters and lick-spittles, in consequence 
of the blood-hounds receiving the thanks of the king for their heroic 
exploits.* A subscription w as set on foot for the relief of such as sur- 
vived, as well as for the widows and orphans of the murdered, and a 
few hundred pounds raised, principally by the "swinish multitude," 
in their clubs and societies; as it was considered disgraceful in the qua- 
lity line to contribute ! Talk of British humanity ! What compassion 
was shown toward poor Byrne, who was imprisoned and cruelly 
whipped, for accusing (and justly^ a stinking beast of a bishop of an 
unnatural crime ; and who, afterward, when detected, got off, having 
a snivelling lord for his brother, as well as the interest of the Church, 
who do not like such affairs to be brought to light before the daddies of 
the lord. Humanity ! ! Who ever interfered in behalf of Mrs. and 
Miss Carlile, and Mrs. Wright, while suffering in loathsome prisons, 
for their integrity and virtuous advocacy of truth ? Who commisser- 
ated the dreadful state of the unfortunate Ogden, when expiring in 
jail under the torments of a rupture ? Did not the spouting cock of 
the walk set the whole kennel of collectives in a roar of laughter, by 
adverting to the sufferings of the " revered and ruptured^^ Ogden ? — 
Humanity! Pshaw! Twaddle! Fudge! Old Nick is humane to 
his favorite imps, no doubt. 

* This horrible tragedy, commonly called the Manchester Massacre, which 
was promoted and directed by two parsons, was discussed in the upper ken- 
nel, (House of Lords>) whon 150 most noble lords voted their approbation. 



PREAMBLE. Vlll 

/ Whatever is, is right," is the cry of the kennel, conse- 
quently there can be nothing wrong ; and when a convict 
swings off in fine style from the new drop, are they not 
assured by the Rev'd Mr. Diddleum, that after they have 
repented of their sins, and received absolution, they will 
mount up to the regions of bliss, be welcomed by the an- 
gelic host, and occasion great rejoicing in heaven ?* Does 
not this prove incontestibly that ' all is for the best,' and that 
whatever is, is right V 

'The man whose soul the blackest vices tanit, 
For Heav'n's glory makes a damn'd good saint.' 

Peter Pindar. 
' Repent then all ye rogues, ye'll be forgiven, 
And give the saints a holiday in heaven.' 

And surely we must acknowledge this to be a most con- 
soling, as well as an encouraging doctrine for thieves and 
cut-throats, who ought to felicitate themselves on being the 
humble instruments of so much merry making, when they 
are dismissed by John Ketch, Esq. with a hempen collar of 
their order round their necks, as a passport for kingdom- 
come, of which no doubt they are not a little proud upon 
their arrival, and swagger away like evangelicals of the 
first water. t Let us, therefore, sing to the praise of the 
Lamb, and his head spouter Paul, and the blessed doctrine 
of 'justification by faith, and atonement for sin,' so admirr^ 
ably calculated for the spread of wickedness, and the know- 
ledge-box of the intelligent Yahoo ! | 

* I say unto you, that joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that 
repenteth,more than over ninety and nine just persons which need no 
repentance. — Luke xv. 

t It is a common saying among felons, that " when the worst comes 
to the worst, they can tip the devil a Redesdale, and get whitewashed 
by the parson at the gallows." 

t " To make the entrance sure for rogue or thief, 
As well as him who lives by honest means, 
Our hero so arranged his belief, 

That ev'n the rogue, provided that he gains 
Both faith and grace, should stand the better chance, 
As all his previous sins would but enhance 

His worth in heav'n ; at least we're often told, 
That o'er repentant sinners by the saints 



PREAMBLE. IX 

But although * all is for the best,' and every thing under 
the superintendence of divine Providence, without whose 
permission a sparrow cannot fall to the ground, (as the spi- 
ritual Jack in a box assures his assinine audience at the 
Fudge-office) yet so little reliance is placed on the asser- 
tion by the poor bewildered Yahoo, that he is incessantly 
worrying the great Jehovah to change his immutable de- 
crees to gratify some selfish or ridiculous whim, notwith- 
standing his drawling whine of ' thy will be done.' One 
asks for an east wind, while another wants a west, &c. — 
And when we consider that the Turks are all bawling and 
screaming on Friday, the Jews groaning and grunting on 
Saturday, and the Christians snivelling and psalm singing 
on Sunday ; and that, in the intermediate days, the Esqui- 
maux, Catabaws, Winnebagoes, Otahetians, Hottentots, &c. 
are all hard at it, howling and bellowing out divine seruice 
in their way, one cannot help thinking that the situation of 
the great Jehovah, so far from being desirable, would not 
be accepted of in exchange by his dark skinned antagonist 
in the cellar, provided he was obliged to continue superin- 
tendent of the two-legged grubs called Yahoos ; and, that 
the latter has the least harrassing and unpleasant employ- 
ment of the two, especially as he can take an airing when 
he pleases, and even trot up stairs on levee days, strutting 
about like a crow in a gutter, and gossiping with the great 
Jehovah ' en famille.' — Job i. 

Those ' whom the Lord loveth he chastiseth,' we are 
told, ' and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth ;' there- 
fore the more we are drubbed the more thankful we ousht 
to be, and the more convinced of his loving kindness ; but 
unfortunately, we are sometimes at a loss to ascertain whe- 
ther it is by the rod of the Lord, or by that of the Devil, 
the stripes are inflicted, as the latter was permitted to give 
poor Job, who was an ' upright man and feared the Lord,' 
a confounded whacking ;* so that it seems the Lord punish- 
There is more joy, by near an hundred fold, 
Than o'er the virtuous souls, of whom complaints 
Had never reached the gods : — this was a bribe, 
A fine inducement for the sinning tribe !" Prize Poem on St.Paul. 

* Poor Job ! he might well lament that he " came out of the belly." 
—Job. iii. : 



X PREAMBLE. 

es US for our wickedness, and the Devil for our good qua- 
lities ! Bravo ! This is being between anvil and hammer 
with a vengeance ! But if all's for the best, and every- 
thing right, why should you grumble ? If we are to be 
bundled into hell, let us eat our pudding, and hold our ton- 
gues, and make the best of a bad bargain ; it's all what 
pleases the Lord, or it would not be, and we ought to thank 
God for every thing — as an old woman used to be contin- 
ually telling her unlucky cub of a grandson, who one t. 
came running in crying, ' Don't you say we should th; 
God for every thing, Granny V ' Yes, to be sure, my de < 
says she. 'Well then,' says Dick, 'I've tumbled do • 
with the basket of eggs you bid me cany to goody Grur , 
and they're all smashed.' ' You unlucky brat,' cries pc ^ 
Granny, ' I've a good mind to lug your ears.' ' Why, l 
th(jught,' cries Dick, we were to thank God for everything ; 
but that's not all, for our cow's dead, and is lying on the 
common ; so there's something else to thank God for, be- 
sides the broken eggs. Granny.' 

' To live in society,' says an intelligent writer, ' we must 
sympathize with it ; but no sympathy can subsist between 
the knaves and fools, who are playing the game of ' make- 
believe,' and quarrelling over the stakes, and the person 
who sees through their trickery, and despises its objects. 
There is no disguising from the cool eye of philosoph 
that all living creatures exist in a state of natural warfar 
and that man (in hostility with all) is at enmity also wi 
his own species — man is the natural enemy of man ; a 
society, unable to change his nature, succeeds but in esta 
lishing a hollow truce, by which fraud is substituted ) 
violence. The honestest and the boldest man must hide 
good half of his thoughts, if he would not be lodged I- 
tween four walls, or interdicted ab aqua et igni. He w 
has not the courage to encounter a mass of evil, must ps 
through life with a bridle perpetually on his tongue. 1. 
must hear with a becoming gravity the words honour a 
patriotism proceeding from the lips of pollution — he mi, 
hold law to be synonymous with justice, persecution w; 
tolerance, general pauperism with national prosperity, prie 
craft with piety, and plunder with loyalty and religion." 

Hobbes affirms the state of nature to be a state of we 



PREAMBLE. XI 

and in what does that of civilized life differ, except that it 
is carried on under a masked battery ? One Yahoo will 
always covet the luxuries and superfluities of another, of 
which he is himself destitute (whatever he may pretend to 
the contrary) in spite of the interdictions of Porteusian 
Bibles,* or canting tracts of ' Christ and a Crust,' &c. with 
which he is gutted till the gorge rises, and but to little pur- 
pose.! Commandments from the Decalogue may be so- 
lemnly mouthed out by the priest, forbidding the Yahoo to 
covet his neighbor's goods, and children told that they must 
not hanker after the cherries or toys of their playfellows ; 
all which are as scrupulously attended to, and with as much 
effect as proclamations would by hungry mastifl^, forbidding 
them to covet each other's horse-flesh. And is not the 
same selfish or envious disposition shown even in factitious 
w^ants ; one Yahoo of the higher class, will envy another 
who has obtained permission from the master of the puppet 
show, to paint a fool's bauble on the pannels of his booby- 
hutch, or stitch it on the corner of his mucus wrappers and 
scullion's dishclouts, to which he thinks he has a better 
pretension himself. 

* The Yahoo, it seems, is now ashamed of the filthy language of his 
kohj Bible, which is at present filtering through ecclesiastical strainers 
to clarify it for the godly ! This is at least an indication of a spread. 
But is it not to be lamented that the emasculated parts, or luscious ex- 
huberances of the holy scripture, (to say nothing of the castration of 
Gibbon and Shakspeare) should be thus lost? Would it not be advis- 
able to collect and publish them under the title of " Tit bits for Godly 
Gormandizers" as a kind of spiritual Lamb's Fry ? (we now can fur- 
nish a penny list for selection), for the benefit of delicate ladies, who 
might thus learn, among other holy matters, on what account admis- 
sion was refused to the "congregation of the Lord." — Deuter. xxiii. 
The time is undoubtedly approaching when this nauseous and disgust- 
ing book will be carefully excluded from every decent family, in spite 
of the parsons, who are working night and day, like devils upon a mud 
wall, to support it. That such demoralizing trash should be consider- 
ed as essential to the poor Yahoo's salvafion, affords a decided proof of 
the superiority of his intellect, so much boasted of! 

t The Report of the Committee for inquiring into the cause of the 

increase of commitments and convictions in London and Middlesex, 

states, that notwithstanding all we hear of schools, and the progress of 

education, juvenile depravity was never so unlimited in degree, or so 

irate in cha.rsiCtei:—Soiithey's Colloquies. 



Xll PREAMBLE. 

All envy power in others, and complain 

Of that which they would perish to ohidiin.— Churchill. 

And, as was observed by Sir Robert Walpole, that by ob- 
liging one friend, he was certain to create a dozen enemies. 
Such is the loving kindness of Christian Yahoos to each 
other, though taught to love their neighbors as themselves ! 
but they are all tarred with the same brush, and play 'the 
same game in their turn. 

Some author has observed, that it is to be lamented, the 
great Jehovah, after proving the incorrigibility of the Ya- 
hoo race, by sousing them all (with the exception of eight, 
whose offspring proved no better), like so many puppies in 
a horse-pond, and smiting, and " swearing in his wrath," 
did not create a fresh batch, free from the defects of their 
Adamite progenitors,* instead of sending his only begotten 
Son as a sacrifice, in company with a ghost (one to milk a 
ram and the other to hold the pail), and all for what ? cut 
bono 1 for although the said Ghost fills the paunch, or the 
sconce, no matter which, of every reverend prig to this very 
day, and without doubt inspires him to sputter forth his 
godly jabber ;t the poor Yahoos remain lost muttons, and 
continue to be trundled wholesale and retail into the tithe- 
barn of the OLD ONE. 

But is it not very extraordinary and inconceivable, that 
the only begotten Son, aided by the Ghost, and under the 
guidance or superintendence of the Father, in their soul- 
saving mission, sent expressly to take away the sins of the 



* Much crime and misery would have been avoided in this " best of 
all possible worlds," if the great Jehovah, when he dabbed up the Ya- 
hoo, had clapped a bell or clicker within him, which should have given 
the alarm whenever he told a lie. There would then have been but 
little want of law and gospel. 

t This Ghost, it appears, first exhibited himself "as the sound of a 
mighty rushing wind," — an odd way for a ghost ! — and settled in the 
shape of " fiery cloven tongues" on the jobbernols of a set of lazy 
lubbers, who, instead of minding their fishing tackle and leather dress- 
ing, went about the highways Maw-worming. But, how do the parsons 
of the present day contrive to get so full of this Ghost, by whom they 
affirm they are called on to spout? We see no "fiery tongues" on 
their lumber-garrets, though we hear them from their mouths denoun- 
cing hell fire to all unbelievers, and such as dare to pry into their holy 
pilfering mysteries. 



PREAMBLE. Xlll 

world, should have succeeded no better ? Three to one, 
they say, are odds at foot-ball ; and who could suppose in 
such a contest they would come off second best, and leave 
the grim fiend triumphant, to snap his black fingers, and 
laugh at their ineffectual efforts to rescue the Yahoo from 
his clutches (which they themselves admit, and to conti- 
nue in his career, " Going about like a roaring lion," (oh ! 
that it were a Picadilly one, that we might laugh at its 
braying !) and seeking whom he may devour ?" 

But " why Goramity no kill debil ?" as Friday said to his 
master, " Goramity all good, all strong !" Ah, why in- 
deed ! poor Crusoe was sadly puzzled, and wished he had 
a bishop at his elbow to answer the poor ignorant savage. 
Whence has the ugly rascal so much power? Is it not 
astonishing, after the repeated attempts of the Lamb & Co. 
(his delegates here on earth), to rescue the poor Yahoo 
from his claws, by bugaboo visitations, Bible-poring, tract- 
snuffling, and hymn-singing,* as well as by catechising, 
churching, confirming, and parsonizing in every way pos- 
sible, that he should still continue in a state of sin ? Is 
it with filthy lucre and the " mammon of unrighteousness" 
that Satan lures the precious soul of the Yahoo from the 
narrow to the broad way, which leadeth to the bottomless 
pit 1 Yea, verily it looketh very like it, for that the Wick- 
ed One knoweth full well to be a never-failing bait, and 
holdeth it up before the peepers of such as are not strong 
in the Lord Jesus ; even as the recruiting sergeant holdeth 
up a shiner to tempt the bumpkin to cast aside his smock 
frock and become a gentleman. And when do our spirit- 



* The following is a specimen of the godly cat-lap the saints regale 
the Lord with in their gospel shops : 

" What is now to children the dearest thing here ? 
To be the LmnVs lambkins, and chickens most dear. 
Such lambkins are nourished with food that is best ; 
Such chickens sit safely and warm in their nest. 
And when Satan at an hour, 
Comes our chickens to devour, 
Let the children's angel say, 
These are Christ's chicks, go thy way," 

Southey's Life of Wesley. 
See more of this stuiF in the Bath Guide, p. 57; with an excellent 
parody p. 129. 

2 



XIV PREAMBLE. 

iial pastors and masters, who are eternally croaking about 
the depravity of the heart, and the corruptive quality of 
riches, ever renounce them if they are possibly come-at- 
able ?* "Tant que la fortune, les honneurs, et le vice seront 
d'un cote, la pauvrete, I'abandon, et la veriu de I'autre, le 
choix des hommes ne sera pas douteux. On pourra vivre 
dans le lice, sans vivre dans I'opprobre, on pourra meme se 
perdre pourune bonne action : mais il y aura un culte pub- 
lic, et ce culte fleurira au milieu des mauvaises mceurs, 
comme un plante parasite sur un tronc pourri.'^f 

" If our tongues correspond with our hearts," says Dean 
Swift, " men will avoid our company, because their faults 
will not be complimented ; and if the heart and tongue do 
not agree, we must certainly have a very mean opinion of 
ourselves, if we have the least notion of honesty ; never- 
theless it is so necessary in life, that it has become an art. 
He that can make his countenance applaud an object, tho' 
his heart despises it, is what is called a imll-bred man, a 
polite gentleman, and one who knows the world." 

The following petite ouvrage was composed at different 
times, from observations of the prevailing follies and vices, 
and irrational conduct of the lords of reason ; the greatest 
part many years since, as may be supposed by the allusion 
to Master Betty, the Cock Lane ghost, &c. It was not 
intended for the press, but written merely as a matter of 
amusement, in a profound retirement, far from the metropo- 
lis, and is now brought by accident before the reading pub- 
lic for their recreation in this ' march of mind,' and ' spread 
of intellect' era ; not with any view to profit, as may readi- 
ly be imagined, but rather in the full persuasion that by 
ninety-nine out of every hundred of the enlightened and 
intelligent Yahoo race, the author will be consigned to the 
fiery lake of the Black Prince. This must naturally be 
expected : very few are pleased when their vices and ab- 
surdities are held up to derision ; especially their darling 
superstitious practices of hocus pocus, mumbo jumbo, and 
fee faw fum ; that being by church logic a " sin against the 
Holy Ghost," and never to be forgiven. The Odium The- 
ologicum, which, as Mr. Lawrence justly observes, is the 



t Letter from the Marquis de Rivarol to M. Neckar. 



PREAMBLE. • XV 

" most concentrated essence of rancour and animosity/' is 
sure to be vomited forth against all such productions as 
militate against their usurpations, and expose their moun- 
tebank jugglery ; for the same reason that policemen are 
execrated and fired at by a banditti of theives when molest- 
ed in the exercise of their profession. This indeed is not 
to be wondered at,, agreeing with Square's " rule of right 
and fitness of things." Caw me, caw thee, and vice versa, 
curry me, curry thee. 

But there is another tribe whose malevolence is conspi- 
cuous upon such occasions, who are paid, as well as the 
former class, for the venom they spit forth, and whose slan- 
der and scurrility is directed against every one whose prin- 
ciples are suspected of being inimical to the " powers that 
be," whether of the Lord Jesus or of the lord of Hell, who, 
as Lord Byron observes, " feed by lying and slandering, 
and slake their thirst by evil speaking," who skulk in the 
dark, and, like an hydra, or many headed monster, begin 
hissing and barking at those who express disapprobation of 
the follies and vices of the higher orders, many of whom 
are notorious for their apostacy, and obtain laureatships, 
and monuments in cathedrals,* from their direliction of truth 



* The great Moralist, or Rex porcorum, it was confidently reported, 
during the American war, and soon after he " changed his coat, and 
would have changed his skin," (as Lord Byron says of the laureat,) 
was engaged in drawing up inflammatory addresses to the negroes in 
the Southern States, instigating them to set fire to their master's plan- 
tations, and go over to the British army, where they would be protect- 
ed and rewarded! At that time Edmund Burke, one of the chiefs in 
the gang of apostates, was such a violent enemy to royalty, that he 
proposed in the collective a reduction of the kingly power, even in 
the article of guttling ! And in later days, have we not JVat Tyler sta- 
ring us in the face, among other barefaced instances of sop-in tlie-pan 
hunters] who have totally disregarded character and principle ? But 

" The silver turnip's tempting skin, 
Draws such base hogs through thick and thin." 
Or, as Churchill observes, 

Convinced, I change J, (can any man do more ? 
And have not greater patriots chang'd before ?) 
Changed, I at once, (can any man do less? J 
Without a single blush, that change confess; 
Confess it with a manly kind of pride, 
And quit the losing for the winning side," 



XVI PREAMBLE. 

and principle ; * possessing supple " wJia wmits »?e" sort of 
consciences, and who are ready for any dirty work at the 
nod of their employers : such have hissed and barked at 
Gibbon, Dr. Wolcot, Horace Walpole, Lady Morgan, Lord 
Byron, and other writers of distinguished abilities ; but 
they are paid for their work, and it's all one to such hire- 
lings whether they labour in the Lord's vineyard or the 
Devil's. 

That we live in a vitiated age (notwithstanding the so 
much boasted " spread and stream of intellect"), and that 
a general corruption has taken place, and rendered morals 
a laughing stock, is notorious and universally admitted ; 
but then we are blessed with a superabundance of godli- 
ness, alias cant,t to qualify it and make amends : every 
pious swindler now can let off half a dozen gospel squibs in 
your face, about Paul's snipping off a bit of poor Tim's 
trapstick,;}: and such holy stuff, and give you chapter and 
verse, like Cuddy's mother in the " Tales of my Landlord," 
while he is drawing the watch or handkerchief out of your 
pocket. 

Such is the modern apostolic race, 

Reform'd, regenerated rogues o? grace — 

Who sigh for heaven, yet God in Mammon see, 

And pick a pocket on the suppliant knee ; 

One eye to God, lamenting moral evil, 

The other winking down upon the devil : 

One voice to Heav'n, " To good my heart incline !" 

And one in whispers, " Satan, I am thine !" 

Peter Pindar. 

And to the same tune singeth Nic,i^ " Non vi e bisogna 
che tu abbia tutte le qualita, che ho detto (religion) ma so- 



* Oh, for a world, ixx principle as chaste 
As this is gross and selfish; over which 
Custom and prejudice shall bear no sway. 
That govern all things here, should'ring aside 
The meek and modest truth, and forcing her 
To seek a refuge from the tongue of strife 
In nooks obscure, far from the ways of men. — Cowper. 

t It is rather remarkable that all official ecclesiastical documents, 
hatched and cuddled into shape at Lambeth, should be signed by the 
grand Humbug, cant ! It is a curious coincidence, and certainly very 
appropriate. 

\ Acts of the Apostles, xvi. § Machiavelli. 



PREAMBLE. XVll 

lamente che tu moslri di averle." And again, in speaking 
on the same topic, he observes, " Ma quest'ultima qualita e 
quella che importa jiiu di ogni altra di avere esteriormente /" 
This is instruction for a prince ! Cant and kingdom come 
for ever ! Amen, 

The Yahoo race consists of two classes, the bamboozlers 
and the bamboozled ; the cry of the latter (of the lowest 
class) is " Gin and Jesus," while that of the upper class is 
*' Church and State," with a " let well alone." The mot- 
to of the knowing ones is, " Si populus vult decipi, decipi- 
atur ;" i. e. 

If humbugg'd thus the people choose to be, 
Why, let 'em, since it brings the chink to me : 
There's none so blind as those who will not see. 

" Oh Dio mio !" said a recent Pope, after giving the 
apostolical blessing to fifty or sixty thousand persons from 
the balcony of St. Peter's church on Easter Sunday, the 
troops gaping to receive it, and the multitude all on their 
marrow bones, the cannons roaring and bells jingling, ' Oh 
Dio mio ! quanto e facile di coglionare le gente !'* 

The mob who stand gaping at the cup and ball juggler, 
are as much delighted as Mr. Lickpenny, who pockets 
their contributions ; as Hudibras observes — 

Doubtless the pleasure is as great 
In being cheated as to cheat. 

ReadIxNg Public, shouldst thou relish the above pream- 
ble, en avant, there's more Sour Krout for thee, and buon 

PRO VI FACCIA, 



Forsyth's Travels. 



*2 



AUTHORITIES. 



For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts, even one 
thing befalleth them, as the one dieth so dieth the other; yea, they 
have all one breath, so that a man hath no pre-eminence above a beas'.; 
fill go unto one place ; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again." 
— Eccles. iii. 

For the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a re- 
ward. — Ibid. ix. 

Nevertheless, man being in honor, abideth not ; he is like the beasts 
that perish. — Psalm xlix. 

So he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more. He 
shall return no more to his house.— Job ix. 

So man lieth down and riseth not till the heavens be no more, they 
shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep. — Job xiv. 
He shall perish for ever like his own dung. — Ibid xx. 

We are all as an unclean thing.* — Isaiah Ixiv. 

What is man that he should be clean ? how much more abominable 
and filthy is man ? — Job xv. 

For the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth. — Gen. 
viii. 

The heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wick- 
ed. — Jesus. 

Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost 
when I came out of the belly? For now should I have lain still and 
been quiet; I should have slept; then had I been at rest. — Job iii. 

Understand, ye brutish among the people ; and ye fools, when will 
ye be wise ? — Psalm xciv. t 

Every man is brutish by his own knowledge. — Jeremiah li. 



* What that is may be found out in Deuteronomy xxiii. 
t Never while they read Bibles. 



TMIE ¥AH@© 



" De tous les animaux qui s'elevent dans I'air, 

Qui marchentsuv lalerre, ou nagentdans la raer, 

De Paris au Perou, du Japon jusqu'a Rome, 

Le plus sot animal, a mon avis, c'est la homme." — Boileau. 



''Could I but choose what flesh and blood Fd wear, 

I'd be a dog, a monkey, or a bear ; 

Or any thing but that vain animal. 

Who is so proud of being rational." — Lord Rochester. 



So sung Boileau, when Louis, styled the Great, 
Kept up his court of profligates in state : 
So Wilmot sung in Charles' vicious reign ;* 
And is there now less reason to complain ? 
The race is much improved we're told — 'tis true ; 
It is improved — in vice, and folly too if 
From bad to worse, whatever is pretended, 
As ale that's sour in sultry weather 's mended. 
The present " all-accomplished'' Yahoo breed, 
May boast their " spread of intellect," indeed : 
The " best of education" now 's the word 
From tripe and dog's-meat venders, to my lord : 
But does this lacker change the Yahoo's nature ?| 



*"His court, the dissolute and hateful school 

Of wantonness, where vice was taught by rule." — Coicper. 

t" Such now are held as nothing. — We begin 
Where our sires ended, and improve in sin ; 
Rack our invention, and leave nothing new 
In vice and folly for our sons to do." — Churchill. 

t "The boasted knowledge of England," says a certain apostate, 
" has not sunk deep ; it is like the golden surface of a lackered watch, 
which covers, and but barely covers the base metal. The great mass 



/ 



20 

Is he not still the same vile, silly creature 1 

The " spread of intellect," so much his boast. 

Is but leaf-gold spread on a rotten post. 

Polish'd he may be, varnish'd high enough, 

But still 'tis ornament on paltry stuff. 

Can a Sir-rev. ... be fragrant made 

By stirring it about with marmalade ? 

" Then just as much you'll mend the breed," says Quin 

To Jerry Melford, with malicious grin.* 

But what says Swift ? — " Oh dear !" Miss Dawdle cries, 

'* That filthy parson's writings I despise ; 

Such poor, low, vulgar stuff, is never read 

By quality, or such as are well bred."t 

Your pardon. Ma'am, a few lines from the Dean, 

Multum in parvo, tells you what we mean. 



Swift tells us then, a cook once tried to make 
A certain something into a plum-cake ; 
He mix'd it up with eggs, and plums and spice, 
And candied orange-peel, to make it nice ; 



of the people are as ignorant, and as well contented with their ignor- 
ance, as any of the most illiterate nations in Europe ; and even among 
those who might be expected to know better, it is astonishing how 
slowly information makes way to any practical utiUty." — Letters from 
Spain. 

* But when I appealed to Quin, and asked him, if he-did not think 
such an unreserved mixture (of the higher classes with the lower at 
Bath) would improve the whole mass? 'Yes/ said he, 'as a plate of 
marmalade would improve a pan of Sir-rev . . . c e.' "—Humphrey 
Clinker. 

t The works of Swift, Smollett, Fielding, Gay, and even Pope, in 
consequence of the vast "spread of intellect," are at present consid- 
ered as low and vulgar, and unfit for the perusal of persons genteely 
brought up, as it is termed, who by everlasting poring over the novel- 
ties of the day, larded with " dove-like eyes, long silken eye lashes, 
graceful attitudes, sylph-like forms, exquisitely fine formed limbs, 
graceful bendings-over and sweeping the strings of the harp," ifec. &c. 
have become so highly purified and double-refined in their feelings, 
that they are almost frightened into fits by any expression of humour. 
Lord Byron is now scouted, it seems, in what is termed genteel society. 
" Plus les mceurssont depraves," says Voltaire, with great truth, "plus 
les expressions deviennent mesurees, on croit regagner en langage ce 
qu'on a perdu en vertu. La pudeur s'est enfuite des ccsurs et s'est 
refugiee sur les levres." ^ 



X 



21 



Then sugar'd it all o'er to make it sweet, 
But still he found it wasn't fit to eat ; 
At last, " God rot the nasty mess !" he muttered, 
" It isn't worth a fig when cooked and butter'd ; 
To mix good things with bad, wiseacres say, 
Is only throwing your good things away." 



Thus, tho' the best of education's given, ^ 
There still predominates the native leaven.- 
One might define the present polished race, 
An outside virtuous, with an inside base ; 
Or class'd with quadrupeds, a kind of monkeys, 
Or ourang-outangs, cross'd with wolves and donkeys ;* 
Whose varied actions analyzed, disclose 
The hateful nature both of these and those. f 
The gods, we're told, produced the precious crew 
To laugh at, when they knew not what to do ; 
When they were all ennui^d with state affairs. 
To make them merry they would peep down stairs : 
And sure the tom-fool's actions here on earth, 
Must cause their godships everlasting mirth. 

Who would suppose, to hear him boast his shape, 
Man bore so great resemblance to an ape 1^ 



* " Read hist'ry thro', in ev'ry page 

You'll see how men with thoughtless rage, 

Each other rob, destroy, and burn, 

To serve a priest's or statesman's turn; 

Tho' acting in a diff'rent name, 

Yet always Asses, much the same." — Dodsley. 

t " Our race in general," says Horace Walpole, " is pestilently bad 
and malevolent;" and Lord Byron seems of the same opinion, since 
he observes, " that mankind are every way despicable in their different 
absurdities." — Letters to Dallas. 

t "Of beasts, it is confess'd, the ape 
Comes nearest us in human shape : 
Like man he imitates each fashion. 
And malice is his ruling passion." — Goldsmith. 
"C'lest une grand question parmi les Negres," says Voltaire, "s'ils 
sont descendus des singes, ou si les singes sont venns d'eux. Nos 
sages ont ditque I'homme est I'image de Dieu ! Voila une piaisante 
image de I'Etre eternel ! qu'un nez noir epate, avec peu ou point d'- 
intelligence." — Lettres d'Amahed. 



22 

The monkey's form is ugly, he'll confess ; 

But what's his own, when undisguised by dress 1 

Of elegant baboons he does not talk,* 

Because they do not on their Innd legs walk ;t 

But give me pug ; what puppy, tho' from France, 

Can vie with him in gambol, or in dance ?| 

If you the monkey with the man compare, 

You'll own the latter dances like a bear. 

Puo- has beside a comfortable coat, 

But what's the Yahoo's hide worth ? not a groat. ^ 

To judge between them fairly, he should strip. 

And show how much he owes to brother Snip. 

If he, (as to compare he should,) appear'd 

In buff, and with a hideous shaggy beard ;|| 

With tangled locks, soot-color'd, we'll suppose, 

Thro' which you just could spy his eyes and nose 



* This epithet (elegant) is now applied to every whiskered puppy 
who struts up and down Pail-Mall, or in the Park, with a cockade in 
his hat, by the wishy washy catlap novel writers of the day, who are, it 
is true, mostly of the feminine gender, and therefore more excusable. 

t " Q,uelques philosophes ont defini I'homme un singe qui rit, d'au- 
tres nn animal credule. Get animal, ajoutent-ils, est monte sur deux 
jambes, a la doigts flexible, des mains adroites: il a beaucoup de be- 
soins, en consequence beaucoup d'industrie. D'aillears aussi vain et 
aussi orgueilleux que credule : il pense que le monde est fait pour lui.' 
— Helvetius. 

X "What mortal can like-monkeys dance a jig ? 

What man from bough to bough like jackoo springs? 
Ingenious rogue, who twists his tail and swings. — Pindar. 

^ John Ziska, it is said, desired that after his death a drum might be 
made of his skin, which he predicted when beat would always teriify 
his enemies, and occasion them to fly; "que le succes," says Helve- 
tius, "justifia toujours;" consequently the Yahoo's hide is good for 
something. 

II As God the Father is always represented with a majestic beard, 
and has made man in his own image, it may be fairly presumed Adam 
was furnished with this superb ornament to the human phiz. Is il 
not then in the spirit of contumacy that the Yahoo deprives himself of 
it, upon the supposition that he looks better without it ? At least, this 
was the opinion of the old twattlers, called " Fathers of the Church." 
Tertullian observes, " shaving the beard is a lie against our own faces, 
and an impious attempt to improve the works of the Creator." — Gib- 
bon, chap. XV. 



23 

XJncomb'd, unwash'd, unlick'd, as he was first, 

When he was manufactured out of dust ; 

There's not a creature that has any sense, 

But what would give poor pug the preference ; 

Instead of viewing him with fond delight, 

They'd run as from the devil, in a fright ; 

Yet this conceited, silly, blown-up elf. 

Affirms Jehovah's made just like himself.* 

Form'd like his Maker ! who could then suppose, 

To hide the workmanship he'd want small-clothes ?t 

Made like a God ! in great Jehovah's shape ! 

Yes, so he would be tho' he were an ape. 

If monkeys ere made gods, their nohle natures 

Would make them like themselves, with handsome features ; 

See godlike Yahoos their devotions pay, 

In Cloacina's temple, night and day : 

The rich, the poor, the humble and the great, 

Set in fine attitudes, and — grunt in state.J 

Like other nohle animals, we find 

He eats, and sleeps, and propagates his kind : 

But then to propagate's so like a beast — 

For Yahoo's in Jehovah's form, at least :§ 



* If God has made man in Iiis o'An image, says Helvetius, the biped 
has returned the compliment by making God in /«s; or, as Voltaire 
observes : 

" C'esi que I'horame amoureux de son sot esclavage, 
Fit dans son prejuge Dieu meme en son image 
Nous I'avons fait injuste, emporte, vain, jalonx, 
Seducteur, inconstant, barbare comme nous " 

t Small clothes and inexpressibles are the delicate molly-coddle terms 
of the dandified, cravat-tying puppies of the present day ; to whom 
the very sound of the word breeches would inevitably occasion faint- 
ing fits, and require an application of the smeUing bottle for their re- 
covery. 

t See an illustrative print called the " State of the Nation," publish- 
ed by Bowles & Co., St. Paul's Church Yard, in which half a dozen 
' lords of the creation,' and as many ladies, are exhibited in grand style, 
pouring out their tributary offerings at the shrine of the goddess. 

§ It is very extraordinary that the action of reproduction of such a 
noble animal as a Yahoo, to which the great Jehovah himself contributes, 
by furnishing it with a sovl, should be considered as shameful and 
wicked, (from the sinful lusts of the flesh,) while the destruction of 
thousands of the noble race is highly honorable and even glorious ! — 



24 

And tho' God says " increase and multiply," 

About the business they seem rather shy ; 

Their females eagerly at times they seek, 

And then in some dark corner with them sneak.* 

Indeed to eat, to drink, to sleep, to propagate, 

Degrades God's "images" at any rate ;t 

And with their pride and boasting but ill suits, 

As on a level placing them with brutes. 

Made like a god ! what ! do they then suppose 

Their god has, like themselves, mouth, eyes and nose ? 

The bloated biped, arrogant and blind, 

Has SEX and form to Nature's God assign'd ! 

(With bushy beard, and genitals, no doubt. 

How could he ever get a son without ?) 

Of gender masculine their god must be. 

And in large letters written him and he ?|: 

Sitting in clouds upon a golden throne. 

In company with Holy Ghost and Son ; 

While twenty thousand trumpeters sit round him, 

Whose blasts must now and then confound him : 

Such heaven, without a mistress or a wife, 

Must be a stupid, muddling sort of life. 

Oh, what a Deity ! give me old Jove, 

With all his jolly company above ; 

Bolinbroke observes, that from an excess of pride man avoids every 
thing that assimilates him to the brute, & consequently gets out of sight 
for the business of procreation, as well as in some other humiliating 
actions by which his dignity is lowered, and which places him on the 
same level with the quadruped. — See Philosophical Essays, vol. i. p. 7, 
and vol. iv. p. 126. 

* " None shun the day and seek the shades of night. 

But those whose actions cannot bear the light." — Churchill. 

t " Lorsqu'on voit," says Montaign, " un chancelier avec sa simarre, 
sa large peruke, et son air compose, il n'est point de tableau plus plai- 
sant a se faire, que de se peindre ce meme chancelier sur la chaise-per-? 
.cee, ou consommant I'oeuvre de marriage." 

t In the present rage of fanatical cant, these pronouns are always 
written in large and marked characters, in the trashy productions with 
which we are inundated ; but a N. B. should be added, to instruct the 
reader to turn up his eyes to the ceiling, and also to cross himself, (as 
a JVlethodist does at the mention of the Devil, ^ whenever these repre- 
sentatives of the great Jehovah stare him in the face. 



25 

And not this gloomy being, with his clerk, 

To watch what Yahoos do when in the dark ; 

And write down whether they all fast and pray.^ 

Or eat a sprat on such and such a day. 

If to your maker gender must be given, 

Why not a. female power reside in heaven ? 

Tho' many vices taint the female breast, 

They're not so gross as man's— tho' bad*s the best, 

'Tis not in virtue, or superior sense ; 

In Brutal sense consist man's excellence. 

Is there a difference of sex in mind ? 

Those who affirm it must be gravel-blind. 

In wit, in genius, and perception true. 

There's not a straw to choose between the two. 

Yet Eve stands foremost in the first-made couple. 

By mustering courage up to eat the apple ; f 

While Mister Adam, like a sneaking cur, 

Ate afterward, and laid the blame on her; 

But jabbering Paul bids women all obey, 

And who to such a jabberer dare say nay ? 

This saint, says Voltaire, had a mutton fist, 

And would have women thump'd as well as kiss'd ; 

But this in tE sop's fables is explain'd. 

Where Leo to the boasting man complain'd-l 

Or if the Yahoo needs must thump his craw, 
Could not the glorious orb attention draw, 
Whose splendid beams diffuse both warmth and light. 
Without which all would be eternal night 1 

* What delectable employment for a Deity, to be eternally watching 
such contemptible grubs in all their silly and wicked actions night and 
day ! And what heavenly gratification to behold 40 or 50,0U0 animals 
upon two stumps, (to say nothing of the horses, they poor things are 
not blessed with immortal souls,) who are cutting one another to atoms 
in his holy name, and with his ambassadors for bottle-holders ! 

t" Here," says she, "you cowardly faint-hearted wretch, take this 
heavenly fruit, eat, and be a stupid fool no longer; eat, and become 
wise; eat, and be a god ; and know, to your eternal shame, that your 
wife has been made an enlightened goddess before you." — History of 
the Devil. 

t Fable of the Lion and the Man. 

3 



; 26 V 

Instead of mnmbling over such hum-drum, 
Unmeaning silly stufFas " kingdom come,"|.' 
About the Father-god " which art in heaven — '* 
(English no parish-boy would have forgiven). 
But then the Sun a maker had, he'll say : 
Suppose it— but who made that maker pray 1 
Oh, he's self-existent I then's the cry ; 
Obscuriumper obscurius, I reply. — 
In metaphysic subtleties thus crost, 
The further we jog on the more we're lost.* 
Discuss'd eternally, it still appears, 
Like Paddy's ale to thicken as it clears. 
But grant man's form divine, on Bible proof ; 
Is not the composition wretched stuff? 
Annoy 'd by winter's cold and summer's heat, 
Which brings by turns kibed heels and sweaty feet,t 
How does the learned SmellfungusJ describe 
The imperfections of the Yahoo tribe l 
Not riff-raff in St. Giles's cellars bred, 
But tip-top quality, by fashion led ; 
Ladies and lords, in Bath assembly rooms, 
Where Yahoo stinks are mingled with perfumes. 
" It was indeed," says he, " a compound vile, 
Which any parish hog would smell a mile : 
Imagine then extremes of stink and sweet. 
From Lavender and musk, and dirty feet ; 
Imposthumated lungs and rotten teeth ; 
Hartshorn, salvolatile, and stinking breath ; 
Sour belchings, running sores, and putrid gums:"§ 



* The King of Prussia, Frederick II., used to say, a metaphysician 
was like a well-digger— the deeper he went the more he was in the, 
dark. 

f'No earthly joys are found complete ; 
The winter's cold and summer's heat. 
Produce kibed heels and sweaty feet." — Old Ballad. 

t Dr. Smollett, so named by Sterne. 

§ If the reader should be a little squeamish, and disgusted with Dr. 
Smellfungus's description of the Yahoo's defects, he is requested to 
cleanse and purify his imagination by reading Rabshakah's delicate 

mag about eating "their own dung and drinking their own ," (2 

Kings, chap, xviii) ; and which, being a choice morsel of holy instruc- 



27 

(Its well he does not mention Jlddle bums f 

Since lords and dukes, with all their fine-dress'd doxies. 

Must carry with 'em there their civet boxes ;) 

■" Rank arm-pits, plaisters, assafoetida. 

Issues, and bergamot, et-cetera ; 

From which effluvia rises to the nose, 

But not ambrosial, you may well suppose ! 

No ! frowsy steams, with odours mix'd arise, 

That might defy old Nick to analyze."* 

Such is the portrait of the Yahoo tribe ; 

Drawn, d'apres Nature, by a learned scribe ; 

One of the M. P. corps, who onght to know 

The animal throughout from top to toe. 

It may be said, 'twould make a CafFre spew ; 

Perhaps it might — 'tis not for that less true. 

Denied it may be, with an awkward grace ; 

But then the conscience flies up in the face. 

Gladly such galling truths would be denied : 

Creation's lords ! ! to be thus mortified ! 

So wise ! so good ! immortal too, and stink so ! 

Who but a beastly wretch could ever think so If 

But if not true, why are perfumer's shops 

Crowded from morn till night with belles and fops ? 

Who purchase essence with their idle pence, 

To smother stinks which give themselves offence. J 

Except one vile, filthy four-legg'd creature, § 

tion, is again brought upon the tapis in Isaiah, chap, xxvi ; and also to 
turn to the inspired gihberish called Leviticus and Deuteronomy, where 
he may read of scabs, issues, running sores, blood, guts, and unclean 
things, chapter after chapter, to his great delight and edification, with- 
out its producing any tendency to squeamishness or hoaking ; this be- 
ing all the word of God, is gulped down like barley-sugar, even by 
novel reading ladies, on the Lord's day ! So that it is not the " what 
is it," but the " who says it," that determines the matter ; as it is not 
to be supposed possible for a Holy Ghost to talk filthily. 

* The whole assemblage, it should seem by the learned doctor's 
account, might with great propriety have exclaimed with the lunatic 
prophet, " we are all as an unclean things — Isaiah Ixiv. 6. 

t See " Clarke's Critical Review." 

t " Painted for sight, and essenc'dfor the smell, 
Sail in the ladies." — Donne. 

9 The Skunk, or Stinkbissem, an animal hunted sometimes at the 



28 

There's nothing so offensive in its nature. 
A pretty demi-god to swell and strut! 
Corruption as he is from head-to foot I 
A bundle of infirmities at best, 
Altho' in velvet robes and ermine drest, 
And stars and baubles glitter at his breast t 
But then he has a soul, a spark divine ! 
That oozes thro' the filthy mass to shine ! 
Tant pis, alas ! since nine are out of ten 
Pick'd up by Blackey for his blazing den f 
Where, being immaterial, they fume 
And frizzle, day and night, but ne'er consume ! 
Now, why should this scrub want so many souls 
Which in war time must people hell in shoals ?* 
Can he have sugar-canes to cultivate ? 
Or sulpher-mines to work on his estate ? 
Or is it malice to his adversary, 
That spurs him on poor Yahoo's soul to worry ? 
Without some motive would he take such pains, 
And sweat and fag, and rack his sooty brains 1 
And like a roaring lion, trot about 
Continually to smell poor Yahoos out ? 
No ; like the biped, he'd not stir for nought, 
Nor give a penny but to gain a groat.f 

Cape of Good Hope, which, when hard pressed by the dogs, lets fly 
from its rump battery such a pestiferous voUey of stink-pots, or rather 
stink-shots, that the dogs are obliged to turn tail, overcame by the suf- 
focating stench. 

" De toutes nos secretions," says Voltaire, " il n'y en a pas une 
seule qui soit bonne a rein ; pas une seule meme qui ue rende le genre 
bumain disagreable." — Questions. Voltaire is, however, mistaken in 
his assertion: urine is valuable to dyers, chemists, printers, and others ; 
and the foeces is now found to be of great utility, and even advertised 
as an article for exportation, under the delicate denomination of Dessi- 
cated Compost, at so much per hogshead, and particularly recommend- 
ed to the West India merchants for the improvement of their sugar 
cane. — See The Times of April 1826, and since. 
* "The greatest chief 

That ever peopled hell with heroes slain." — Byron. 
t "We found no bait 

To tempt us in thy country. Doing good, 

Disinterested good, is not our trade ; 

\Ve travel far, 'tis true, but not for nought," — Coicpcr. 



29 

The Yahoo, ignorant of Nature's laws, 

Presumes himself to be a final cause : 

** Sun, moon, and stars, he cries, " and earth and sea, 

Are all created but to pleasure me." 

But is not Gay's flea's logic just as good, 

Who deems the man made only for his food ?* 

The parson says indeed, he's but a worm j 

But still he's modell'd on Jehovah's form. 

Jehovah's form, poor wretch, 'tis very plain. 

Excess of pride has addle'd his poor brain. 

When of his godlike qualities he raved, 

His heated noddle should be closely shaved : 

Endow'd with cunning, tho' devoid of sense. 

He hides what gives his vanity offence,! 

Or tries to hide it, rather, should be said. 

Like the poor ostrich, who conceals his head ; 

And when this vice he can no longer hide, 

Tis brazen'd out, and then call'd decent pride. 

But what is decent ? what does decent mean ? 

Just what we please ; 'tis nothing but a screen — 

A trick, a subterfuge, a sophist's cavil, 

To make vice virtue, and to cheat the Devil, 

Yes, shufHe and disguise it how we will, 
Tis pride and envy rule the Yahoo still ; 
Abstracted from these passions, we shall find 
'Tis but a lifeless lump that's left behind 4 



* Gay's Fables. — See Voltaire's excellent ' Discours sur rHomme.' 

t " L'orgueil est egal dans tous les homraes, et il n'y a point de dif- 
ference qu'aux moyens, et a la maniere de le mettre au jour."— i?oc^- 
foucavlt. 

X If it were possible to lake pride and envy from the human species, 
grass would soon grow in Bond street and Cheapside. "Man without 
envy and pride," says Mandville, " may, with great propriety, be com- 
pared to a log in a pond, with but little inclination to exert himself" — 
Fable oftfie Bees. Horace Walpole remarks, that "envy, though one 
of the worst and meanest of our passions, seems somehow natural to 
the human breast." — JValponiana. Smoltet says, "lam inclined to 
think no mind was ever wholly exempt from envy, which perhaps, may 
have been implanted as an instinct essential to our nature." And Ar- 
buthnot, speaking of party violence, upon the death of Brandy Nan, 
says, in a letter to Swift, " I have an opportunity, calmly and philo^ 
sophically, to consider that treasure of vileness and baseness that I al- 

*3: 



30 

Take pride and envy from the belles and fops, 

The bauble-venders soon must shut their shops. 

Like other animals decreed by fate 

To eat, and drink, and sleep, and propagate. 

But for his rationality^ his boast, 

If ever he possessed it, 'tis now lost. 

Reason ! oh, name it not \ tis profanation :* 

The reasonable Yahoo fears damnation ; 

The reasonable Christian is baptized ; 

The reasonable Jew is circumcised : 

(For by the holy snipcock operation,! 

The Lord will recognize the " chosen nation":j: 

When the last trumpet sounds, and all like bearr, 

Are scrambling for their bones to get up stairs : § 

The Christian infant's made a babe of grace, 

By having water sprinkled on his face ; 

(Quaere, would not the holy water tell, 

if sprinkled on the backside, just as well ? 

The Old One might be skulking thereabout, 



ways believed to be in the heart of man." — "Notre envie," observes 
Rochefoucault, "dure toujoars plus long teraps que le bonheur de ceux 
que nous envious." 

* " Ce qui est le plus contraire a la droite Raison e'est cela meme 
apres quio on court le plus avidement. Demandez vous pourquoi? 
C'est que presque tous les hommes sont Fous." — Erasnie. 

t Le prepuce est coupe en ceremonie a de I'age huit ans (the holj 
book says eight days) on a porte dans quelques-unes de nos villes le 
saint prepuce en procession ; on le garde encore dans quelques sacris- 
ties, sans que celte facetie ait cause le moiudre trouble dans les famil- 
ies." — Q,uestions. 

t For thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy God : the Lord hath 
chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that 
are upon the face of the earth." — Deut. vii. They might have been 
the chosen people," said Lord Rochester ; 

" But why the Devil they were chose, 
The Lord himself sure only knows:" 

as from their beastly conduct, it might have been supposed they were 
the Devil's leavings. 

§ As we see God " in the flesh," CJob. xix.) the bones must be want- 
ted of course. This is, however, contrary to the assertion of St. Paul, 
who says, " flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God."--l Cor, 

XV, 



31 

And then the cross would keep the rascal out ;) 

While some more learned, solemn, owl-phizz^d fools, 

Well cramm'd with rubbish from the lumber-schools,* 

Baptize the unborn infant with a squirt, 

Without the child or mother being hurt If 

What reasonable conduct ! all are right, 

Jews, Turks, and Christians too, are all delight 

For this whene'er they meet, to scratch and fight.J 

What reverend harpies ! what a brawling crew ! 

In all their deeds the cloven-foot peeps through ; 

Fraught with the musty tenants of a college, ~ 

These self-dubb'd wranglers boast there classic knowledge. 

No wonder they the heathens do despise. 

Since they to Christian doctrines shut their eyes ; 

No blessed Gospel in their skulls was cramm'd, 

For want of which (thank God) they're now all damn'd : 

Had they been bless'd, like us, with Gospel-light in 

Their noddles, they'd (saint like) have gone to smiting. 

Oh, blessed Gospel-\\^i \ who'd e'er suppose 

From such pure light that saints should come to blows ? 

Yet such are Evangelicals ; who boast 

Of being crop-cramm'd with the Holy Ghost ! 

The jargon of the frothy spouter Paul, 

Bothers the pericraniums of them all. 

" Cast off the old man," Maworm cries ; " tis plain, 

You must be damn'd unless you're born again.^* 

Some howl for grace, some for predestination, 

Some for election, some for reprobation. § 

Aloud you'll hear a Praise-God Barebones bawl. 



* " Filling frantic crowds of learned fools 

Those reverend bedlams, colleges, and schoola."— Lor<Z Rochester. 

t The Doctors of the Sorbonne have decreed,that though no part of 
the child's body should appear, it may be babtized by injection : " par 
le moyend'une petite canuUe, sans faire tort a la mere." — T. Shandy. 

t " Par piete ils se traitent mutuellement de blasphemateurs et d'im- 
■pie3."—Volney. 

§ The reader who may wish for amusement as well as information 
from the holy gibberish, is referred to Clarke's excellent Critical Re- 
vieio. 



82 

" Ye're muttons lost, unless ye have a call ! 

And so are they who of their good works brag, 

Self-righteousness is but a filthy rag. 

iSweet Jesus only sinners must confide in, 

And guard against ' short-comings, and ' backsliding/ 

Without faith in the Lamh to hell you'll go ; 

But Lamb's-blood washes you as white as snow." 

All full of Jesus, each light-headed sect 
Boasts loudly of their " spread of intellect." 
From Gospel-light, or rather Gospel-dung,* 
What crops of muddled nincompoops have sprung ! 
Hernhutters, Jumpers, Ranters, Harmonites, 
Revivers, Squatters, Calvinists, New Lights, 
Arminians, Quakers, Muggletonians, 
Socinians, Anabaptists, Antinomians, 
Swedenbourgs, Arians, Shil-Southcotites ; 
The major part rank fools, the rest rank bites. 

Such are the Christian Yahoos, who delight 

To blindfold reason with their inward light.f 

Peter and Paul are conn'd ; but, still perplex'd, 

They rummage Luke, and Mark, and Matthew next ; 

From text to text the pious buzzards fly, 

While " the land stinks, so num'rous are the fry." 

Yet some of these pure saints now seem to think 

" Whitfield, in one of his ranting sermons at Glasgow, in the year 
1742, thus expresses himself; '* O Lord dung us with Jesus Christ, that 
we bring forth much fruit for thee". — See Lewises Memoirs, And in 
writing to Lady Huntingdon, the same preacher of the blessed Gospel 
says, " I have just now risen from the ground, after praying to the 
Lord of all lords to water your soul every moment, honoured madam." 
—SotUhey's Wesley. Tom Brown quotes the following prayer from 
one of the frothy spouters in his time : " Souse us, O Lord, in the 
powdering-tub of thy grace, that we may become tripes fit for thy heav- 
enly table ; sweeten us with the sugar-candy of thy mercy, O Lord, 
that we may all be rendered lollypops and bull's eyes for the righteous 
in kingdom come !" 

"^ t "'Tis such a light as putrefaction breeds 

In fly-blown flesh, whereon the maggot feeds ; 
Shines in the dark, but ushered into day, 
The stench remains, the lustre dies away." 

Cotoper. 



33 

Young girls may too much in the Bible squint : 

And stumbling upon passages obscene,* 

Must wonder what such paw-paw words can mean* 

Does holy mulch then hatch such precious crops 1 

Or are they cuddled in old blackey's shops ? 

Whence can such crowdsof frantic fools proceed ? 

From Gospel ! Yes, they're all of Gospel breed. 

While pious tracts of " Christ and Crusts" abound,! 

Saints are in every hole and corner found. 

We're so be-sanctified, so truly blest, 

So Gospel-gorged, poor Maw worm cannot rest ; 

But starts red-hot, a missionary bite, 

Eager to give poor heathens Gosp^d-hght : 

Poor Maw worm finds more pigs than teats at home, 

So ventures forth 'mongst infidels to roam, 

To preach to Ashantees God'^s holy word. 

To kick out Scratch, and introduce the Lord ; 

Tho' by his pious eflfbrts it appears 

He sets them altogether by the ears : 

For tho' the man of God no labour spares, 

Nick will amongst the wheat still sow his tares. 

Ye pious missionaries ! let us know 
How many are converted where you go ; 
And whether, while ye in your lingo prate, 
The Holy Ghost stands by ye to translate. 
In your next kind communications tell us, 
'y^ether the Lord of savages is jealous.:{: 

* Teaching the poor to read so generally has cut out plenty of em- 
ployment for the spiritual sow-gelders, who are now as busy as the 
Devil Ln a high wind in grubbing out the impurities from the holy bal- 
derish.lest their chaste female devotees might now dnd then be shocked 
by readings© often about " going in unto her," &c. 

t The title of a favourite tract, originating in the answer of a poor 
woman, who, when asked by an evangelical lady if she was in want of 
any thing replied, 'No my dear madam, thank the Lord •, I never caa 
be in want of any thing while I have my Christ and my Crust." 

t "Thou shalthaveno other gods but me: for I, the Lord, am a 
jealous God," &c. If the great Jehovah was jealous in regard to the 
worship of such a tribe of filthy, stinking, hiimgruffin snipcocks, as 
his favourites appear to have been, it is not to be wondered if he were 
also and likewise respecting the prayers and supplications of the Cata- 
baws, Ottogamies, &c. when addressed to the Great Spirit in the Car- 
Bin. 



m 34 

And whether, when ye treat them with rum-grog, 
They're not for holy gospel more agog ; 
And oft come after baptism rather mellow, 
Roaring out, " Goramity, damn'd good fellow ! 
More grog, good raassa parson, more baptize :"* 
Then are n't ye struck with horror and surprise 
To hear them, when they're told the Lamb is God, 
And that their sins are wash'd out by his blood. 
Cry out, " Oh, Benamuckee ! massa parson, fie ! 
Dat wat you preash be one big god-dam lie ; 
For if young litel goramity Lamb, 
Den great old goramity be de Ra?n" 

Oh, reverend leeches ! ere the world ye roam, 
Why not convert the infidels at home ? 
Is all your credit with Jehovah lost ? 
Have you no Shilo, nor a Cock-lane ghost ? 
Why not let off a miracle or two ? 
A subject from the churchyard raised would do ; 
Or send a man to walk, as it is said 
Saint Dennis did in France, withont his head ; 
Something to terrify and make us stare, 
And tumble on our marrow-bones to pray'r ; 
Something to put the rabble in a quaking : 
The Lord, no doubt, would bless the undertaking ; 
Since ye all fag and labor for his church, 
He can't in conscience leave ypu in the lurch. 
Try what your praying to the Lamb can do, 
And bring a ghost or bugaboo to view : 
As ye're all bless'd with faith, ye cannot doubt 
But what the Lord at last will help ye out,; 
Nor turn his back upon such holy men 
Who feast upon his carcass now and then. 

Witch-hunting Jammie, a true Lord's annointed, 

♦Horace Walpole (speaking of China") says, " This China is indeec 
a bad dose : hundreds of millions are there seen who have never hearc 
of Christ of Judea. 

Even the Salvator Mundi died to no purpose ! only to save the 
hundredth part of a fraction ! What an insult to the faith I We ought to 
have a crusade against those Chinese, and baptize them in their blood> 
by all means — the shocking infidels l—JValpoliana. 



35 

As ever by the Devil was appointed,* ". 

Was by the Gospel-preaching vampires told 

The " word of God" was better than pure gold ; 

That lucre, and the riches of the earth, 

Were dross, compared with such transcendent worth. f 

(They should have said, this " pearl above all price" 

Enabled saints to live in sloth and vice.);}: 

But tho' it proves such to those reverend leeches, 

Who chouse the rabble with their pulpit-speeches ; 

And who, by virtue of the " holy word," 

Cram their fat paunches, and cry, " Fear the Lord ; 

Is it not to the laity a curse ? 

Could Belzebub have ever sent a worse ? 

Has it not set, wherever it was known, 

Wife against husband, father against son 1 

To love your wife or child's a grand mistake — 

You're taught to hate each other for Christ's sake.^i 

Take no thought for to-day ; and when you die, 

The dead may bury you, or there you lie.|| 

" Compel them to come in," the parsons bawl, 

Or excommunicate them one and all. 

Woe be to those whom they dare trample on, 

For where they have the power they spare none. 

Lift but a finger at the sacred sty, 

" The church — the church's in danger !" they all cry. 

Wherever JUthy lucre much abounds, 



* " IfsLich kings are by God appointed, 

The DevH might be the Lord's annoinled. "-Lf/r^Z Rochester. 

+ See the canting, fawning, fulsome, toad-eating, lick-spittle, and 
true priestly dedication of the translators of the blessed book to the Bri- 
tish Solomon. 

t " Q,ui legit historiam ecclesiasticam, quid legit," says Grotius, "nisi 
Titia episcodorum ?" 

$ " I am come to send fire on the earth." ("Very like a benevolent 
Deity ! ) " Suppose ye that I come to give peace ? I tell ye nay ; 
but rather division : the father shall be divided against the son, and the 
son against the father ; the mother against the daughter and the daugh- 
ter against the mother." — Luke xii. 

II " And he said unto another, Follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer 
me first to go and bury my father. Jesus said unto him, let the dead 
bury their dead, but go thon and preach." — Luke ix. 



36 

The pack are on the scent like staunch fox-hounds ; 

Wealth to obtain, their Machiavelian plan 

Is to promote dissension where they can. 

Do different sects in friendship e'er unite ? 

No ; Christ's disciples all like tigers fight. 

The Lambkin said he came to bring a sword,* 

And, Lamb like, Christians use it for their Lord. 

Oh ! had the Yahoo eyes, he'd plainly see 
What bitter fruit grows on the Gospel tree ; 
What pestilential crabs have ever grown, 
And ever will, where'er this tree is known. 
Look round the Globe — for near two thousand years, 
The Cross has deluged it with blood and tears ;t 
Nor will the Yahoo happier days e'er find. 
While he with Gospel-light continues blind : 
His intellect may march, as he supposes, 
But in the mud 'twill stick with Christ and Moses. 
Of real intellect there'll be no spread, 
Till such stuff 's driven from his bother'd head. 

With few-faw-fum and mummery beguiled, 
The Yahoo's brains are addled when a child ; 
And when adult, he learns from Godly books, 
The Lord's best pleased when he has dismal looks. 
The Christian's Messed book has cured the earth,}: 
And brought them strife and war, instead of mirth. 
The tidings far from making them all glad,§ 
Gives them the doldrums, and drives thousands mad. 
Does'nt Augustine (the greatest saint who brought 



I*" Think not that I am corae to bring peace on earth ; I am come not 
to send peace, but a sword." — Matt. x. 

t " The scene of Christianity has been always a scene ofdissentioB, 
of hatred, of persecution, and of blood." — Bolingbroke. And what 
says Erasmus: " Sanguin fundata estecclesia, sauguiu crevit, sanguin 
succrevit, sanguin erit." 

t " Among other precious relics," says Mr. Walpole, ' ' which we 
were treated with the sight of at this convent, we were shown a piece of 
the blessed fig-tree which our guide said had been cursed by Christ.r— 
Walpole's Correspondent. 

§" O thou that bringest good-tidings to Zion ! " 



37 

The precious twaddle, here which we're all taught,) 

With Jerome, Cyprian, and Tertullian too, 

Pronounce us damn'd if pleasure we pursue 1* 

Did not the pious Origen, to save him 

From Nick's claws, cut off what Jehovah gave him? 

And thus escaping from the Old One's gripe, 

Sing hallejahs with soprano pipe ! 

For had he been by woman led astray, 

He must to hingdom-come have lost his way ; 

Since Jerome tells us ! that their very touch 

Is worse than mad dog's bite, their venom's such ! f 

Does'nt the Lamb himself, such joys despising, 

Hold forth in favour of this eunuchizing ?| 

Hence parsons, tho' so given to caterwauling, 

'Gainst " sinful lust o' the flesh" are always bawling. 

A cheerful look denotes a want of grace ; 

John Bunyan wears no smile upon his face ; 

John bids us groan and pray, and sob and howl ; 

For should you not, Nick nabs your sinful soul. 

Unhappy Cowper ! tho' with genius blest, 
By this true Christian night-mare was opprest : 
His mind infected with the curse, he cries, 
'* The cross, the cross alone can make us wise !" *^ , 
Has not this cross, this emblem of salvation. 
Rendered this life a temporal damnation ? 
Is not a crucifix a horrid sight ? 
Yet Christian Yahoos view it with delight ! 
A naked man upon a gibbet nail'd, 

* See " Gibbon's Decline and Fall." chap. 15. 

t See the note on dancing, in the conclusion. 

+ " And there be eunuchs which have made themselves eunuchs for 
the kingdom of heaven's sake." — Matt. xix. 

^ Yes, if lunacy is wisdom. This horrid emblem of Christianity has 
transformed the poor Yahoos into blood-drinking tigers. Will it be 
credited, that representations of the detestable crucifixion used to take 
place on Good Friday in some of the convents in Paris, when infatu- 
ated women Cperhaps 'prepared by opium) were actually nailed by 
their hands and feet to a cross ! in which horrid state they were kept 
several hours? One poor creature expired in agony, after drawing out 
the nails from her hands and feet. — See Baron Grimiri's Correspori' 
dence. 

4 



38 

By squeamish girls is ev'n with rapture hail'd ! 
They call it Lamb, Sweet Jesus, and Dear Saviour ! 
And out-rant Bedlamites by their bahavior. 

See surly Johnson, frighen'd by adream, 
Come roaring like the monster Polypheme ; 
He heard his mother in the night call " Sam "* 
And heard himself say, " Mother, here I am !" 
A back-bone Christian, gloomy and uncivil — 
Praying to God, and trembling at the Devil. 
With superstition haunted day and night, 
He dreamt of ghosts, and hags and second-sight ; 
Credits old silly women's tales of witches. 
Who once to Bozzy he affirm'd were bitches. f 
His long-tail'd words astound the gaping mob. 
Who think the Doctor had a wond'rous nob. 
Bow-wowing triads, like a mastiff-dog, t 
And in politeness distanced by a hog ; 
Irascible and savage in debate, 
Thwart him, perhaps you risk'd a broken pate ; 
Rouse Ursus-Major, and in growling tones, 
He threatens a la Crib to break your bones. ^ 
Yet tho' to manners he has no pretence. 
He is call'd the Moralist, par excellence I 
The Doctor knew (he gang, 'tis very plain, 
And he pufF'd those who pufT'd up him again. |{ 



* See "Boswell's Life of Johnson." 

t '• Nought proved the non-existence of the bitches." — Bozzy and 
Pozzy. 

X " Lord Pembroke said once to me at Wilton, with a happy pleas- 
antry and some truth, that Dr. Johnson's sayings would not appear so 
extraoidinary were it not for his boio wmo way." — BosweWs Life of 
Johnson. 

§ The Doctor was told Foote had an intention of caricaturing his 
hoggish manners and pompous fustian on the stage. " If the dog does," 
(the usual expression of the great Christian moralist, J says he, " I'll 
break every bone in bis skin." — See Lexiphanes. Surly Sam, alias 

Rhinoceros, had knocked down , a booJ<seller in the Row, who 

had oflfended him, and of which he frequently boasted. 

II The Doctor, however, was not always * up to snuff' in this particu- 
lar, and till iiis apostacy neither obtained pudding nor praise. In the 
first editions of his lumbering Dictionary, the vfOid Pension was defin- 



39 

He's now a demi-saint ; but few shine brighter, 
Either as Gospel-sniveDer, or smiter. 
Yahoo, admire thy hoggish Christian brother ; 
'Tis natural for hogs to like each other. 

Opes not the gloomy " Night Thoughts" Young declare, 
That Christians all should spend their time in prayer ? 
That laughter's half immoral, and that song,* 
And dance, and mirth, to Beelzebub belong 1 



ed, " the pay of a state-hirelins: for treason against his country." See 
Lexiphanes, page 24, note. But, as this was not the way to procure a 
sop in the pan, the great moralist wheeled to the right about, roared to 
a contrary tune, and, naturally superstitious, bespattered the church 
party with adulation, perceiving the great influence they possessed in 
society, and their power to puff up or suppress any one by their reviews 
and Oiher publications, as they might think fit. With this party he soon 
succeeded ; and as all his writings were in favour of church and state he 
was not overlooked by those in power, and soon obtained a pension of 
£300 per annum, and became in a short time the "great Dr. Johnson.^' 
And as Dr. Shebbeare was pensioned at the same period, it gave rise 
to a sarcastic joke, that the king kept two bears, a he-bear and a she 
bear. The followingdescriptive lines of the ^reaf moralist, by Church- 
ill, may not be unacceptable to the reader: — 

" PoMPOSo, insolent and loud, 

Vain idol of a scn^&Ziw^ crowd : 

Whose very name inspires an awe ; 

Whose every word is sense and law ; 

Who, cursing flattery, is the tool _"* 

Of every fawning, flattering fool ; 

Who proudly siezed o^ Learning'' s throne, 

Now damns all learning but his own ; 

And makes each sentence current pass, 

^\\h puppy, coxcomb, scoundrel, ass. 

For 'tis with him a certain rule. 

The folly's proved when he calls fool : 

W^ho, to increase his native strength, 

Draws words six syllables in length. 

With which, assisted by his frown, 

By way of club, he knocks us down ! 

His comrades terrors to beguile, 

Grins horribly a ghastly smile : 

Features so horrid, were it light. 

Would put the Devil himself to flight." 

See The Ghost. 



■» (< 



Laughter itself is half immoral ; 
Pardon a thought that seems severe." — Night ThouglUs. 



40 



* 



That sublunary pleasures tend to evil/ 
And lead backsliding sinners to the Devil ? 
Hence Holy Bible-grubbers quail and quake, 
Scared at the " wrath to come," and " fiery lake f 
Hence saints have all such sad Good-Friday faces, 
Peepers turn'd up, long jaws, and queer grimaces : ^ 
If singing psalms with godly spunk o'erflowing, 
They sing as if they to the Drop were going. 
(Whether the Lord loves music there's no saying, 
But sure he cannot like such asses braying ! 
Such lullabies, tho' meant to compliment him, 
And to his " praise and glory" must torment him ; 
When their vile snuffling, dismal strains he hears, 
No doubt in haste he buttons up his ears, f) 
All day by old Scratch haunted, in a fright 
They go to bed, and dream of hell at night. 
The " sinfulness of sin" so much prevails,^ 
They think the Devil's always at their tails. § 

* " When pleasure's seized, compute your mighty gains ; 

What is it but rank poison in your veins ?" Young^s Satires. 

^^^ So sings this sanctified, woe-stricken son of the church; who 
under the heaviest denunciations against worldly pleasures, and the sin 
of participating in them, hunted after "^^t/^y Zi^cre," and the mammon 
of unrighteousness," with the greediness of a dragon. See a curious 
letter of the reverend Doctor's, in the whining way, to lady Suffolk 
(when Mrs. Howard,) in T/je Mirror, No. 78 : and also his load-eating 
blarney to Silly Bub,* Sir Robert Walpole, the Duke of Dorset, &c^ 
&c. in his Satires and Dedications. 

+" And yet how many a voice, and pipe, and chord, 
Bray to the praise and glory of the Lord ! 
How merciful is Heaven to bear such pother, 
And not knock one thick skull against the other T" 

P. Pindar. 
X A favourite expression of the Maw worm tribe. 

§ " A look of horror spread all o'er 'em, 
As if they saw hell-fire before 'em ; 
And Satan with a sable pack 
Of long tail'd devils at his back, 
Ready with pitch-forks to begin 
To push 'em all by dozens in." — Homer Burlesqued. 



^ Bubb Doddington, it is said, complained of his Christian name to 
Lord Chesterfield, who advised him to prefix Silly to it. 



41 

Such saints may smile perhaps in " kingdom come," 
But here on earth they look confounded glum ; 
And tho' they fear not Satan, they all cry, 
Their dismal phizzes give their tongues the lie. 
You'd think such Lamb-like saints could never fight ; 
But when they heathens meet, they're bound to smite. 
Cutting their throats who don't believe the Word, 
Is '' labouring in the vineyard of the Lord ;" 
And smiting Infidels, and Jews, and Turks, 
Rank foremost in a Christian's holy works. 

Does conscience check him ? No ; he boasts the deed : 
Infants, if heretics, are doom'd to bleed. 
(Jehovah's butchers are not over nice ; 
" Nits," they exclaim, " in time will grow to lice.")* 
The saint exults — his parson eggs him on, 
And tells him all he kill'd to hell are gone. 
What's conscience then ? A fudge of putty made ; 
To murder for the Lamb no saint's afraid. 
Conscience is taught to slumber at such times ; . 
There's no remorse felt for religious crimes. f 
The saints beg God will give fhem strength and grace, 
For smiting " hip and thigh" l^e heathen race ; 
And should th' ungodly ever come in view, 
That " over Edom they might cast their shoe,"J 
" Oh, blessed Lord !" the Gospel blood-hounds cry, 
(Their verjuiced mugs all turn'd towards the sky,) 
" To smite the infidels, oh ! grant that we 
In thine hands humble instruments may be ! 
Permit us in thy name to cut off all 
Of Ahab's race that p — s against the wall ;§ 
Like holy Samuel in thy name to smite,;|: 



* A common expression when children were murdered at Paris, on 
St. Bartholomew's eve, as well as in the Irish massacre. — See Mrs. 
Macauley's History of England, year 1641. 

t " Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum." — Lucretius. 
X " Over Edom will I cast out my shoe." — Psalm Ix. 
The custom of throwing the shoe, or striking a person with it, seems 
{0 be continued in the East to the present day. — See Hajji Baha. 
$ 2 Kings ix. 

il " And Samul hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord." — 1 Sam, 
XV. 33. 

*3 



42 

And to our knees in blood for thee to fight. 

A Bible in their hands, the godly crew 

Have a" carte-blanche" fer whatsoe'er they do : 

All full of " praise-God-zeal," they smite away, 

Then drop upon their marrow-bones to pray. 

Oh, Fate, pray keep all Mawworm Christians from me, 

For where they come they play up Hell and Tommy ! * 

Thou, non com. biped ! boast your holy trash — 

Your Bible-calipee and calipash ; 

Your blessed Trinity, where One is Three, 

And orthodox and lunatic agree ! 

Mix'd up with humbug, fudge, and contradiction, 



* A proverbial expression, signifying skylarking, rowing, going it, 
or kicking up a rumpus, or a bobbery; and particularly applicable to 
assemblages of squabling, crack-brained fanatics, which always end in 
riot and confusion : e. g. (among many others) a meeting was held at 
the London Tavern a short time since, for religious discussion between 
the Catholics (^who, it appeared, had been challeriged by their adversa- 
ries) and the Methodists, or Evangelicals, tA'o squads holy, par excel- 
lence, when Miss Ti?iphone and her godly bickerings, and hell and 
Tommy was played up in style. Swift speaking of the wrangling 
fiddlers, says, 

" Strange that sljch dmbrence should be, 
'Tvvixt tweedle-dum and tweedle-dee." 

May we not say also, 

'Tis strange such hellish wrath should rise, 
Tw]xt heavenly saints of kingdom come; 
While one ghng hocus-pocus cries, 
The other bawls torfiefaicfum. 

When in the heat of the debate, fisty cuffs commenced ; and, in the 
woids of the so much admired Greek poet, 

" Some ciench'd their fists, and then would dart 'em 
At others^ nobs, secundum artem ; 
While some got punches in their stomachs, 
Others got kicks which gave 'em bum achs." 

The " argumentum baculinum" was then resorted to, and a general 
hubbubboo ensued. The Methodist party, by far the most numerous, 
vociferating, " Down with 'em ! Break the necks of the ungodly ! 
Show 'em a short way from Dan to Beersheba ! " Meaning, that the 
Pavishes, as they were called, should be thrown over the staircase ; 
which in their red' hot fits of godly zeal, would have taken place, but 
for the interference of the constables, who had been called in to prevent 
further mischief: the chairman of the Evangelicals, Mr. P., roaring out 
like a bull all the time to ''comprehend all as made a disturbance," 
although it was entirely occasioned by their own party. 



43 

Surpassing all th' extravaofance of fiction : 

Incomprehensibles amalgamate 

With all the rubbish in your choak'd up pate ; 

Whatever is impossible believe — 

'Tis holy logic, and can ne'er deceive.* 

Saint Athanasius, pitying your condition, 

This nostrum found to save you from perdition, 

Which must prove efficacious, understood, 

Especially to noddles full of mud : — 

Three Gods are seen by all possessed of grace. 

As plainly as the nose upon your face ; 

The conjuror comes, with " Presto, fly, be gone !" 

And lo, they're metamorphosed into one ! 

But in the hodge-podge, mixty-maxty mess, 

Which are th' efficient, we are left to guess ; 

And therefore, when w^e pray, we ought to know, 

If it should not be to the Lord and Co. 

But why on three Gods only do you fix, 
Since you so oft acknowledge five or six ? 
Why elbow out, against all common sense, 
So rudely, Nature, Heav'n, and Providence 1 
There's not a day but what, with turn'd-up eyes, 
You these as deities apostrophize. 
And then so ungallant, so like a bear, 
To oust thus (fie upon you !) Madarne Mere ! 
Across the Channel there's your Yahoo brother, 
Admits the Yirgin in the firm as Mother ;t 
While you with gloomy Calvinistic snout, 
In college fashion, turn the lady out ;| 



* " Credo," says the lunatic Tertulian, '^ quia irapossibile est." — "II 
n'estrien cru si fermement que ce qu'on sgait le moius, ny gens si 
asseurez que ceux qui nous content des fables." — Montaigne. 

t IF the Virgin Mary is not comprised in the Trinity, she is at least 
worshipped and more idolized than the third Person, alias the Ghost. — 
See Smollett's Travels. 

t Several places are held in the universities by bachelors only, who 
forfeit ihem by marrying ; and the same popish custom is observed at 
Lambeih, where archbishops' train bearers (what true Christian humil- 
ity !) are dismissed if they marry. 



44 

And leave with all your holy orthodoxy, 
The blessed Trinity without a doxy. 

jEsop's poor heathen had a god and beat him ;* 
Enlighten' d Christians make a God, and eat him : 
Christ's flesh and blood is by the faithful taken,f 
And gulp'd down just like so much beer and bacon. 
But when this holy stuff is in the crop, 
Does it for ever undigested stop ? 
Or does the sacramental peck and hooze, 
Thro' chitterlings with other matter ooze 1 
By peristaltic motion groping on, 
All its soul-purifying virtues gone ? 
And then, in this contaminated state, 
Be turn'd out rudely at the postern gate 1\ 
Sure, spawn'd from hell's dark pit, some wretched dreamer 
First thought of gobbling up his " dear Redeemer V\ 

Oh ! heaven-born Yahoo ! sure thy Christianity 
Is folly's " ne plus ultra," or insanity ! 
Who but an idiot, or a bedlamite, 
Could take such diet, and with such delight ? 
Then, like ^faithful sacrament receiver, 
Thunder damnation on each unbeliever. 
Egregious dolt ! would any but a stark ass, 
First make a God. then prey upon his carcass ? 
The " paragon of animals," indeed !^ 

* Fable of the man and his Wooden God. 

t " The body and blood of Christ, (a dainty dish for a Yahoo ?) 
which is verily and indeed taken and received by the faithful in the 
Lord s Supper." Among other lunaticsects of Christians w|io delight- 
ed in gobbling up their Maker, there was one who used to mix the blood 
of children in iheir sacramental wine ! Another "body and blood'' 
crew had a custom of cramming ailing infants with a sacramental 
bread, at the risk of choking them, with a view of saving them from 
the Devil ! — See Bailey, word " Catapbrygians," and "Moral Philoso- 
pher," vol. i. p. 113. 

t' " Mais mon cher ami," lui dit I'Empereur, " tu as mange at bu 
ton Dieu, que deviendra t'il quand tu auras besoin d'un pot de cham- 
bre ?" — " Sire," dit frere Rigolet, " il deviendra ce qu'il pourra : c'est 
son Si^am -Dialogue entre VEmpereur de la Chine et Jesuite. 

$ Shakspeare. 



45 

On the Lord's "flesh and bl'ood^' like hogs to feedf 

Then wipe their muzzles, and come raving forth, 

To murder heathens in their Christian wrath : 

Nor is it infidels alone they smite. 

The pious Christians one another bite ;* 

Each sect upbraids the rest with superstition,! 

And boast their wisdom in this curst condition ! 

Thro' all the scale of animated nature. 

There is not such another stupid creature !j: 

Writs now seem wanted wheresoe'er we go, 

Of " inquirendo de lunatico," 

Yes ; superstition is the Yahoo's curse, 
That strips the flock to cram the pastor's purse.. 
When call'd religion, it cajoles the weak,<^ 
Who then, from fear of hell, the parson seek; 
To Mumbo-jumbo, or grim Juggernaut, 
Or Bennamuckee, just as they are taught — 
To Moses, or Mohammed, or to Christ ; 
By superstition one and all enticed : 
Each bigot cries, his head with rubbish crammM, 
" Mine's true religion — all the rest are damn'd ;" 
While church, and synagogue, and mosque all yell^ 
And send each other's devotees to hell : 



*" For now the war is not bet^A een 
The brethren and the men of sin? 
But saint and saint, to spill the blood 
Of one another's brotherhood." — Hudihras. 
"Dans tons les tems on voit !es inembres de TEglise de Dieu dis- 
poses a s'arracher-les yeux." — Le Citateur. 

t " Ignorance and fear produced superstition, and superstition in its 
turn maintained ignorance and fear in the minds of men. Thus, su- 
perstition broached the notion of inspiration ; and when the notion 
was once estiiblished, and the fact believed, supposed inspiration 
served to confirm and authorize supersution." — Bolingbroke's Philoso- 
phical Essays. 

X " J'ai augmente I'ouvrage d'un volume, que les sottises hnmaines 
m'ont fourni : c'e^t une source inepuisable." — Le Sage. And Gibbda. 
in his posthumous works, observes, that " man is the greatest fool of 
the whole creation." 

§ Hobbes says, and with great truth, '* Religion is a superstition in 
fashion; and superstition a religion out of fashion. "^ 



46 

Encouraged by their priests they smite away, 
And murder's soon the order of the day.* 
Wherever Superstition's imps have been, 
A Golgotha, or place of sculls is seen;. 
Wherever she has reared her hydra head, 
There human blood in torrents has been shed ; 
Chains, gibbets, racks and wheels, her steps attend, 
And hell-born " Acts of Faith" her throne defend.f 
Crusades and Paris massacres proclaim. 
With Ireland's murders, her infernal fame. 

Such arc Jehovah's pious, blessed race. 
Born " babes of wrath," but changed to " babes of grace 
Yes, " babes of grace ;" and pretty babes they are ! 
And well they fatten upon Gospel fare. 
From sin original, the parson's sprinkling 
Cleanses the infant Yahoo in a twinkling ; 
The holy water washes off the sin, 
Infuses grace, and makes the devil grin. 

Ah, Blackey ! you may howl, and grin, and chatter, 
(God bless the parson and his holy water) ; 
Tho' you chous'd Eve and Adam long ago. 
We do not care a button for you now. 
Yet sure 'tis strange a rascal like old Scratch, 
Should for the great Jehovah be a match ! ^ 
For now his royal highness well may boast, ^ 



*" Excites par la voix des pretres sanguinaires, 

Invoquaient le seigneur en egorgeant leurs freres." — Voltaire. 
See L'Esprit, Discours 2, chap. 24 ; also La Loi Naturdle, 3me partie. 

t Auto-da-fe. — See Questions, torn. ii. p. 324. 

t " Le bon Dieu c'est s'est reellement trorape dans votre eysteme, 
car s'il avail prevn que son ennen)i etnpoisonnerait ici bastoutessea 
OBUvres il ne ies aurait pas produites; il ne se serait pas prepare lui- 
meme lahonte d'etre continuellement joue et vaincii." — Questions. 

§ Whether this cock of the walk, vi^ho goes about "like a roaring 
lion," Cnot the way by the bye to lure gulls, one should suppose,) and 
is acknowledged as Prince of Darkness, is entitled to the appellation 
of royal or serene highness, the Herald's College might perhaps deter- 
mine ; and also whether the whole corps of ***** and serenes are not 
his descendants. Bui surely he ought not to be deprived of his just 
and proper titles, nor refused the homage and respect of the Yahgo 



47 

That by his cunning Paradise was lost ; 

Since Eve and Adam both from thence were driven, 

Because he got his .... kick'd out of heaven. 

Oh, Johnny Noakes, Tom Tram, and Jack o'Nory, 
Assist us to relate this pretty story ; 
Which proves the Yahoo has a precious noddle, 
And that he, precious stuff, can in it coddle. 

It seems then, Blackey, full of hellish spite, 
As well in such a case, indeed he might, 
Said to himself, " As sure as my name's Nick,* 
I'll play Jehovah some damn'd scurvy trick. 
A pretty rig, by God ! I'm kick'd down stairs, 
Because I did'nt choose to say my pray'rs. 
Or sit contented with my naked rump 
Upon a cloud, to blow a penny trump : 
A chin-cough in that way I've often got, 
Sitting without my breeches, like a sot, 
Tantara-raring it with all my might, 
While cherubims squall'd f " Holy !" day and night ;| 
Expecting to be paid, instead of which, 
I'm bundled out with kicks upon my breech ; 



race, of whom we are assured he snaffies up a decent crop ; and who, 
therefore, ought to be always cap in hand to deprecate his wrath, and 
ingratiate themselves in his favor, with a view of good usage and a 
snug birth in his chimney-corner: for, although he is now in the suds, 
who can say but that he may get his chin above water again some day ? 
(as Huet observed, when he bowed to the statue of Jupiter at Rome;; 
and then he might recollect and reward those who had paid their res- 
pects to him in his adversity. 

* One might suppose, from the multifarious cognominations, as the 
learned Doctor would style them, that this scoundrel had kept compa- 
ny with our Newgate birds; alias Tom, alias .Tack, &c. &c. — Scratch, 
Nick, Beelzebub, ^"atan, Lucifer, &c. — !See Hudihras, vol. ii. p. 201, 
De Foe's History of the Devil, p. 39, where he has no less than twenty- 
one names and titles. 

t Perhaps we may be told there were no saints in heaven at that 
time: perhaps not; but as the great Milton has introduced them (see 
Paradise Lost) we may be allowed the same liberty of manufacturing 
nonsensical anachronisms. 

t " Cherubim and seraphim continually do cry, Holy," &c. 



48 

And after nine clays' arsy-versy* roll, ^ 
Am poked in this damn'd black Calcutta-hole ; 
It stinks of brimstone, too — God blast it ! Well, 
No matter — here I shall be king of hell.J 
In hell I'll reign then — now I know the worst ; 
But if I'm not revenged, may I be curst. 
I'll watch Jehovah's motions day and night, 
And find some way to give him kick for bite : 
If second best I've come off at the scratch, 
Some hell-fire row I'll yet contrive to hatch. 
Shall make his worship squint nine ways at once, 
Or sit me down a damn'd thick-headed dunce. "f 

This said, he " grinned a ghastly smile," and watch'd 
An opportunity, which soon he catch'd : 



* " Arsy-very — heels over head, topsy-turvy, preposterously." — 
Bailey. 

t "Nine days they fell." — Paradise Lost. So says the sublime Milton. 
But surely this is puny fustian! It should have been nine ?/ea/"S at 
least, to denote the vast distance of hell from heaven ; though, from 
the gossip of Dives and Lazarus, we might snppose they were near 
neighbors, on the opposite side of the street; but, then, would not the 
heavenly choristers be annoyed with the smell of sulphur, now and 
then, from the den of the snake, when the wind set that way, while 
they were chaunting hellelujah ? 

t " Better to reign m hell than serve in heaven." — Paradise Lost. 
S Although his cloven footed highness expresses himself here like a 
blackguard Cwhich should be overlooked, if we consider his irritated 
slate,) yet we find that he could swagger like a prince, and chatter like 
a prime one at other tinies ('perhaps, as Shandy observes, it was when 
be shook otF his brimstone tunic, and put on a clean shirt,) when he 
was with his cronies fhis staiF officers we may suppose j — 
'' To me shall be the glory sole among 
Th' infernal powers, in one day to have marr'd 
What He ^Almighty styled^ six nights and days 
Continued making; and who knows how long 
Had been contriving! — Paradise Lost. 

Contriving! and after all to be outwitted by the Old One! A pretty 
contrivance, truly I Only think, as Cobbett says, of the great Jehovah 
being humbugged and laughed at by such an arrant blackguard ; and 
all, or most of the Yahoos, tumbled into the dark hole, because he neg- 
lected to put on his spectacles, and look sharp after the snake in the 
garden, or had overslept himself in his Siesta, which we may presume 
he did sometimes, by his favourite Davy's calling so lustily to him, — 
" Awake, O Lord ! why sleepest thou ?" 



4D 

For great Jehovah, it appears, thought fit 

To make a world from scraps — and this is it ; 

This hodge-podge, hurly-burly patched-up planet, 

With nothing worth a bunch of dog's meat in it, 

Excepting for one highly favored class 

(For step-dame Nature sends the rest to grass) ; 

Mix^d up with odds and ends, where dry and wet, 

And cold arid heat, and light and dark, all met ; 

Tho' at the first it looked so spruce and nice, 

' Twas by the angels nicknam'd Paradise. 

And here, as in the holy book we read, 

A Yahoo cock and hen were put to breed. 

In hopes their offspring all would say their prayers, 

And thus the empty benches fill up stairs, 

(For Scratch had, when kick'd out in this fierce squabble, 

Drawn after him a hell-fir'd gang of rabble.) 

Then to the naked, loving Yahoo couple^ 

Jehovah said, " Mind, never touch an apple ; 

Cram if you like, from morn till night, your guts 

With hips and haws, and blackberries and nuts ; 

But should you meddle with my Nonpariel, 

By ail that's good. Til send you both to hell. 

So mind your hits." For tho' in "kingdom come" 

He all things knew, and dealt in fee-taw-fum ! 

And in all common rigs was sharp enough, 

In this black joke he was'nt up to snuflV 

With all his gumption* he ne'er smelt a rat, 

Or dreamt what Mister Nickibus was at \ 

He never guess'd what schemes the dog was brewing. 

To bring his pretty Paradise to ruin ; 

But fagg'd, day after day, like any Turk : 

When up popp'd Sooty Dun, and spoil'd his work. 

No sooner did he hear of Paradise, 

Than off his rump he jump'd up in a trice ; 

Scrubb'd his black phiz and brimstone carcass well, 

Lest he should be discovered by the smell : 

Then greased his boots, and over gat-es and stiles, -* 

Ere you could- sneeze, he'd stride you twenty miles ; 

* ' Gumption, or runiguraption, comprehension, capacity.' — Crilb's 
Memorial. 



50 

So eager was the dog to find out Adam ; 

Or, what Avas to his purpose more, his madam :* 

Drest " a-la-mode de puppy" for this rig, 

With baboon whiskers, like a Bond street prig ; 

And was (compared with Eve's clodhopping honey) 

A pretty, smirking, hell-fired Macaroni. 

Now, seeing Eve in buff, (for in those days 

There were no laws against such expases,)f 

It made his liqu'rish chops so run with water. 

He couldn't rest a jot till he got at her ~ 

His jawing-tackle then he ply'd so well,^ 

She quickly nibbled at his NonpareiL 



And now a pretty mess we should be all m^ 
Did not the parson kindly help us out, 

Owing to their confounded caterwauling ;;|: 
But holy water makes the Devil scout. 

Why did'^nt Adam crop the rascal's ears ? 
Or rather, why not snip off his bull's 



Then of old Scratch we should have had no fears, 
Nor in his oven e'er been shov'd to frizzle ? 



* His madam! Yes, undoubtedly she was; and a precious, poor^ 
soft piece of putty-like stuff the good woman seems to have been !-^ 
She is first cajoled by the Old One, alias the Smike ;' and then goes a 
caterwauling with Mister Adam, without the parson's abracadabra; 

consequently, we are all sons of a w . See De Foe's History of 

the Devil, p. 58. 

" When Beelzebub first to make mischief began. 
He the woman attack'd, and she gull'd the poor man ; 
This Moses asserts, and from hence would infer, 
That woman rules man, and the Devil rules her-" 

t Q,uery — Is not the law against exposing the person an indirect in- 
sult against the great Jehovah, seeing he has made the person in hisown 
imao-e ('without breeches undoubtedly)? What! ashamed of the so 
much boasted workmanship ! 

t "Whosoever looks back to Adam, and considers all the calamitous 
consequences that attended his error, will no longer imagine the fatal 
fruit to have been an apple, but the sense to be figurative. 'Tis plain 
that eating was not the crime, for we find neither the palate or mouth of 
Eve punished ; bijt when we hear ' she shall bring forth xcith pain,^ 'tt'* 
easy to disppver the offending part."— S^c^/it's Discourse. 



51 

Had not Eve munch'd the peepin* like a jade, 
No holy sprinkling we had ever needed ; 

But all have cried with Kecksy,t " Who's afraid ?" 
In short, the parson had been superseded. 

Then, since these Slugs all profit so by evil, 
Why try of vice the torrent so to stem ? 

Why should ihey be so spiteful to the Devil ? 
Were Blackey diddled, what becomes of them 1^ 

So much for Paradise, so wisely lost ! 

So much for Nickey, and his dingy troop ! 
For millions, with this rebel, down were toss'd, 

And now in hell are sipping brimstone soup. 

Who, that had comtnon sense,^ could e're believe 
This silly trash of Beelzebub and Eve — 
Of trees of life, and Adam, and his apple? 
None with the intellects of Sancho's Dapple. 
Yet this fine story, drest in pompous phrase, 
Forms the first book in these enlightened days ![} 



* Toote's OratoYs. t Irish Widow. 

i 'An' ye tak' awa' the Deil,' says the Scotch proverb, ' ye may bid 
glide bye to the Laird.' It would be a dreadful loss indeed to the 
black-slug tribe if Old Nick was to 'kick the bucket,' or be lost in a 
fog. There would then be wailing (but no garnishing of teeth) with 
a vengeance, and they might have recourse to "sackcloth and ashes" 
with propriety. 

§ 'Nothing,^ says Lord Chesterfield, 'is so uncommon as common 
-sense.' Some author remarks the slowness of its growth, and says the 
aloe is a fool to it in comparison. 

Jl'Cobbett, speaking of this work, says, "the whole poem is such 
'barbarous trash, -so outrageously offensive to reason and common 
-sense, that one is naturally led to u'onder how it can have been toler- 
ated. But it's the fashion to turn up the eyes when Pai"adise Lost is 
mentioned; and if you fail so to do, you want taste — you want judg- 
ment even if you do not admire this absurd and ridiculous stuff." — 
Register, vol. xxxiv. p. 43.^. These remarks will no doubt be ascribed 
to Cobbetl's vulgarity and defective education; but the same objection 
cannot be made to Lord Chesterfield, who has considered Paradise 
Lost in nearly the sameilight. 'I confess,' says his lordship, ' that I 
<!annot possibly read Milton through. Not having the honour to be 
acquainted with any of the parties in his poem, except the man and 



This childish tale affords supreme delight, — 

When nonsense is the bait the gudgeons bite. 

Cram ghosts and bugaboos in every tale, 

To please " creation's lords" you'll never fail ;* 

Or give them precious holy gospel stuff, 

Their maws with that can ne'er be cramm'd enough 

Naught in that blessed book e'er comes amiss ; 

Tha' old Rabshakah talks of " drinkmg p-ss,"t 

And " eating their own dung," 'tis all divine — 

Good Christian Yahoos would go there to dine.t 

'Tis only typical — dung means hot pies, 

And p-ss means claret, seen with proper eyes. 



the woman, the characters and speeches of a dozen or two of angelsr 
and of as many devils, are as much above my reach as my entertain^ 
ment. Keep this secret ; for if it should be known, I should be abus- 
ed by every tasteless pedant, and every solid divine in England.'— 
Letter 299. See Voltaire's Candide, chap. 25. 

* " Ces sujets plaisent naturellement aux hommes ; ils aiment ci qui 
leur parait terrible ; ils sont comme les enfans, qui ecoutent avidement 
ces contes de Sorcieres et de Ravenans qui les effrayent. II y a des 
fables pour tout age, et il n'y a point de nation qui n'ait en les siennes. 
— Essay sur la Poesie Epique, 

t " And Rabshakah said, Hath my master sent me to thy master, and 
to thee, to speak these words? Hath he not sent me to the men that 
sit upon the wall, that they may eat their own dung and drink theiv 
own piss with you ?" — Isaiah xxxvi. 

t And why shouldn't they ? Chacun a son gout. The swinish mul- 
titude lick their gills at such holy grub, we are informed, in the eastern 
world, and no good reason can be assigned why they should not in the 
western, if they are so disposed. Why should not the contents of the 
close stools of the most reverend and right revei«aad daddies in th© 
Lord be as sweet, relishing, and sanative, as those of the Grand Lama, 
and his holy crew of lickspittles? For /ic could not be supposed prolific 
enough to furnish q. s. from his own sacred civet-hox to satisfy the rav- 
enous maws of his loving subjects, who purchase it at an extravagant 
price, dried and grated, to regale with on holidays and grand festival!?, 
when it is brought forth and considered as an exquisite- delicacy and 
" honne bouche, pour faire les viandes plus piqu antes." Oh che gusto ! 
"Apellez-vous ceci foire, bren, merde, matiere fecale? C'est Saphran 
d'Hibernia !" — Rabelais. See Tndependevt Whig, iii. 133 ; U Esprit, 
157 ; and Notes to Hudtbras, ii. 304: also Volney, 331, atid ^uestio7is, 
viii. 235, upon this very important subject. 



53 

Oh, silly biped ! Rochester was right ; 
You shut your ears to truth, your eyes to light ; 
In spite of Nature's friendly admonition, 
You curse yourselves, and plunge into perdition. 
A four-legged beast who would not rather be ? 
From such sophisticated reason free : 
They follow all the instinct of their natures, 
And are, compared with man, the wiser creatures : 
They can't be made the miserable tools 
Of church and state^ like us poor two-legg'd fools.* 
The parson's dismal fire and brimstone tale 
^o four-legged cattle is of no avail, 
(And no priest e'er was known so great a sot, 
As go to work where nothing's to be got.) 
They cannot have their skulls mud-cramm'd by priests ; 
No hells or -bugaboos will frighten beasts : 
No craft can make these four-legg'd soulless things, 
Fall on their knees to worship priests and kings ; 
The adoration kings and priests expect 
Is from proud man, who boasts his intellect, 

Yes, that's his boast ; the slang we daily, hear : 
The mind now marches — like a grenadier ! 
Oh, glorious, wond'rous " march of inj^llect !" 
From Yahoos brains what may we not expect ? 
Mind marches now ; when thro' that it has got, 
'Twill go the next stage at a gentle trot ; 
Then set off at a gallop, reach the goal, 
And prove the Yahoo's body is all soul ? 
That then he'll be, tho' doubted heretofore, 
Like Homer^s vengeful hornet, " soul all o'er."f 

*" Brutes find out where their talents lie : 
A bear will not attempt to fly ; 
A founder'd horse will oft debate 
Before he tries a five-barr'd gate ; 
A dog, by instinct, turns aside, 
Whene'er he sees the ditch too wide } 
But man we find the only creature, 
Who, led by folly, combats Nature— - 
Who, when she loudly cries forbear, 
Fixes with obstinacy there." — Swift's Raphsody. 

t " So burns the vengeful hornet, soul all o'er."— Pope. 

5e 



54 

Who'll then deny the biped's capability f 
Or say he cannot reach perfectibility ? 
Who'll then deny, unless they're gravel-blind^ 
O'er matter the omnipotence of mind 1 

Oui great improvement now's our daily boast^ 
And verifies the proverb — little roast ! 
But do these empty boasters ever prate 
Of " march of intdlect" in church and state I 
In these essentials what is ever done 
To show us that the " mind is marching on V^ 
Those who contrive to keep the Yahoo blind, 
Are always prating about " march of mind." 
In law or gospel does it stir a peg I 
Oh, no ! it there has got a broken leg- 
Do not the Jew-book and law jargon show, 
We're what we were five hundred years ago ? 
The youthful mind with godly catlap fed. 
Is bored with what the Lord to Moses said' ;: 
(For Moses and the Lord were very great, 
And gossiped like old women tete-a-tete ; 
Till poor Lord Moses,* falling in disgrace, 
Was not allow'd to see Jehovah's face ; 
Though still permitted his hack parts to view,f 
And cock his quizzing-glass up at his Cue.) 
The holy Bible therefore is the book 
Where young and old should for instruction look. 
Then hug thy " Scripture''^ Yahoo never doubt it ; 
You'd tumble headlong in the pit without it : 
For though it isn't in the Ghost's handwriting, 
The parsons all declare 'tis his inditing. 
What inspiration glows in every line ! 
Aby gat Iky ! — isn't that divine ? 
Then Iky begat Jacob ; Jacob, Joe ; 
And Joe begat read Scripture, and you'll know 



* " Lord Moses," forsooth ! Yes, he is so dubb'd by Joshua (Num- 
bers xiO : the lordliness and consequence of our right reverend prigs 
is therefore not so much to be wondered at. 

+ " And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh 
unto his friend, ' And thou shalt see my hack parts, but my face shall 
not be seen.' " — Exod. xxxiii.— See Clarke's Critical Revietc, 37. 



55 

(No wonder they were dubb'd a "chosen nation," 

Being such dabs at holy propagation,) 

Of wond'rous things beside that " came to pass ;" 

Of kings turn'd oxen, and then turn'd to grass : * 

As how a fiery cab and horses flew 

From kingdom-come to fetch a conj'ring Jew ;t 

Of evangelic tales of cocks and bulls, 

And snakes and codlings, fit for gobemouche gulls j 

Of Noah's ark, a pious rigmarole,;]: 

Or, as Tim says, " a choice tale, fath and sole ! "§ 

Then, for old women, there's a bouncing tale 

Of Jonah in the belly of the whale ! || 

With jaw-bone Sampson, humbugg'd by his doxies, 

Who fasten'd tail to tail three hundred foxes !T[ 

* And Nebuchadnezzar was driven from men, and did eat grass as 
oxen. — Dan. iv. 

+ And it came to pass, as they still went on and talked, that, behold, 
there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them 
asunder ; and Elisha went up by a whirlwind into heaven.— 2 Kings 
ii. 11. 

. t " If the Devil could but exert himself," says De Foe, " as an histo- 
lian, for our improvement and diversion, what a glorious account he 
could give us of Noah's voyage round the world in his famous ark ! 
He could resolve all difficulties about the building, and provisioning of 
it, for the different creatures ; and also inform us whether the animals 
offered themselves as volunteers for the voyage, or whether he went a 
hunting for them,'' &c. — Hist, of the^Devil. 

§ Foote's " Knights." 

II " And Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three 
nights." • The great fish that swallowed up Jonah, surrendered him 
again without hurting a hair of his head, or even charging him any 
thing for his three day's lodging.' — New Monthly Mag. 

" Then, for a pretty Bible tale, 
Haven't you one about a whale 
That swallow'd Jonah ? though the Jew 
Had such rank flesh, he made him spew." 

Homer Burlcsquul. 

U " And Sampson said, With the jaw-bone of an ass have I slain a 
thousand men." This was certainly pretty good smiting, especially 
for a lord Judge. No wonder he was weary and thirsty, since, at the 
rate of one a minute Cand allowing the Philistines to have had paper 
skulls, it could not have been well done in less timej, it would have 
required seventeen hours to get through the job, without any time for 



56 

Poor Jerry's " old cast clouts" and " naughty figs ;''' 
Elisha's bears ;t the Devil and the Pigs ;| 
A talking jackass, next — blind Balaam's Neddy,§ 
Who to the prophet's thwack's replied so ready : 
Then, for quack-doctors what a charming prize, 
There's clay and spittle salve to cure sore eyes !|1 
Lot's rib of salt, with his two brimstone jades. 



rest and refreshment ! But what a dab at fox-hunting this Lord judge 
must have been to catch 300, and then lie them tail to tail, that they 
might run the better ! No wonder such a Lord Judge was diddled by 
Dally. 

* " And he said unto Jeremiah, Put these old cast clouts and rotten- 
rags unde? thine arm holes, &c. — One basket had very good figs, and 
the other basket had very naughty figs." — Jer. xxxviii. 

t " And there came forth little children, and mocked him, and said, 
Go up thou bald head ! And Elisha cursed them in the name of the 
Lord" ('one should have thought it was in the name of the Devil) ; 
and there came two she-bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two 
children of them." — 2 Kings ii. 

A proper punishment for snotty brats, who called the Lord's conju- 
ror bald-pate. But what a crusty cock of a prophet ! Didn't he know 
that of such was the kingdom of heaven ? Though perhaps they may 
learn better manners when they are there, otherwise they might have 
called him baldpate again when they met with him in the upper gal- 
lery, where we may presume he could have found no she bears to tare 
them. 

t 'Then went the devils out of the man, and entered into the swine.' 
We are not informed (which is much to be regretted) at which door, 
front or back, these devils trotted into the pigs' apartments, though it 
is most likely it was at the postern gate, as they were hardly such spoo- 
neys as to run the risk of being guillotined by trying for admission at 
the snout door; besides, they could so much easier slip out at the 
back door, when they were surfeited with chitterlings and pig's fry, 
and bilk their landlords. 

§ " And Balaam's anger was kindled, and he smote the ass with a 
staff; and the Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto 
Balaam, What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me ? and 
Balaam said unto the ass, Because thou hast mocked me. And the 
ass said unto Balaam, Am I not thine ass ?" What a holy and edifying 
confab ! It is a pity the Lord does not open the jaws of the poor ani- 
mals at present, that they might threaten the brutal Christian Yahoo 
drivers with the ' wrath to come' for their infernal cruelty. 

II And he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he 
annoiuted the eyes of the blind man with the clay. — John ix. 



57 

Who were so terrified at being maids* 

They made their old dad groggy — how sublime ! 

Children should read such godly books in time. 

Oh, blessed Scripture ! what a heavenly treasure 

For those who read and can reflect at leisure ! 

What squabbling tribes of " tites, and ites, and hites r 

Uzzites, Hittites, Moabites, and Gir-go-shites 1 

How edifying ! Then, what chaste discourses 

Of ladies who, for sweethearts, talk of horses !t 

Oh shame, where is thy blush ? Here's godly reading, 

To teach young girls at boarding-school good breeding /| 

(From whence sent to their Ma's, accomplished quite, 

They read the " word of God" on Sunday night ;) 

Zekiel's bonne-houche, too ! which the dainty Jew 

Turn'd up his nose at, saying he should sp . . ;§^ 

Why couldn't this old Tyke have lunch'd in quiet, 

* 'And Lot's wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt/ — 
Gen. xix. Saint Ireneeus fwhat saints \) says, the wife of Lot remains 
''dang le pays de Sodome, non plus en chair corruptible, mais en 
statue de sel permanent, etmontrant parses parties naturellesles effels 
ordinaires." Tertullian (another of the gabbHng gang called Fathers 
of the Church), in his poem on this very delicate and important subject, 
says, 

'' Dicitur et vivens alio sub coi'ndre sextlS 
Mirifice solito dispungere sanguine menses.^" 

Docter South has observed, in speaking of the Apocalypse, that if 
it did not find the reader mad, it always left him so ; but may not the 
same be said, with great truth, of the whole bundle of inspired trash, 
which fills half the mad-houses in Europe ! 

t " For she doated upon their paramours, whose flesh is as the flesh 
of asses, and whose issue is like the issue of horses." — Ezek. xxiii. 

t See the pompous Prospectus of Mrs. Grant's establishment at 
Park house, Croydon ; in which Mrs. G. observes famong other fro- 
thy stuff) that " the church and scriptural catechisms, with the records 
of the Holy Bible, are deeply impressed on the tender minds of the 
young ladies committed to her care, by constant study and written ex^ 
ercises." 

$ 'And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with 
dung that cometh out of man in their sight. Then eaid I, Ah, Lord 
God ! behold my soul hath not been polluted." — Ezek. iv. We njay 
observe, that, owing no doubt to the extreme delicacy of the translators, 
the word hake is substituted for eat. The original, or at least the Latin 
text, is, " placentem antem hordei quam comedcs ipsam stereoribus ex- 
crementi humani, parato in occulis illorum." 



58 

Said grace, and lick'd his gills, for such choice diet ? • 

Then Davy, how superlatively good ! 

Who wished to wash his petticoats in blood ! 

And that the bow-wows running in the street 

Might lick the blood from off his holy feet !* 

Blest Davy, " after God's own heart" the man ! 

Who put Uriah in the battle's van, 

And got his rib ;t but this displeased the Lord, 

Who by the parish conjuror sent Kim word, 

That on the house top his seraglio 

Should with his neighbor be a public show, 

Before all Israel, and before the sun ; 

i( Which, no doubt, caused the old-clothes mob much fun.) 

A prophet, next, comes tramping through the streets,:}: 

Bare-buttock'd, telling all the girls he meets 

That he had been with child, and brought forth wind, 

Which sounded like a harp (perhaps behind) ;|| 

And that if ladies rigg'd themselves so fine, 

And put rings in their snouts, like filthy swine, 

The Lord would smite them all with scabby nobs. 

And (what's more shocking) show their thingumbobs. If 

* That thy foot may be dipped in the blood of thine enemies, and 
the tongue of thy dogs in the same. — Psalm Ixviii. 

t ' Thus saith the Lord, I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and 
give them to thy neighbor, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight 
of the sun ; for thou did'st it secretly, but I will do this thing before 
;all Israel, and before the sun. [Pretty stuff for the Lord to jabber 
about !] So they spread Absalom a text upon the top of the house, 
^and A-bsalom went in (how delicate) unto his father's concubines, in 
the sight of all Israel." Only te7i ladies! Bravo, little Aby ! No 
wonder his dad fretted after him so, when he was caught by his ragged 
locks to the tiee. In the prophesy, his neighbour was to lie with his 
wives; it is fulfilled by his son lying with his concubines. Mais c'cst 

egal — it's all holy in the eyes of the Bible-grubbers. A t 's as good 

for a sow as a pancake. — See darkens Review. 

I 'And the Lord said, Like as my servant Isaiah hath walked naked 
and barefoot three years, &c., so shall the king of Assyria lead away, 
tlie Egyptians prisoners and captives, young and old, naked and bare- 
ioot, even with their buttocks uncovered. — Isaiah xx. 

§ ' We have been with child, we have been in pain, we have as it 
were brought forth wind.' — Isaiah xxvi 

II ' Wherefore my bowels shall sound like an harp.* — Isaiah xvi. 

If ' iVIoreover, the Lord saith, Because the daughters of Zion are 



59 

Such is the Christian Yahoo's holy treasure, 
Which yields knaves profit, and gives idiots pleasure ! 
Since Holy Bible reading is the taste, 
No wonder all our females are so chaste. 
Can ribaldry like this be edifying, 
So full of smiting, smuttiness, and lying ? 
What holy hogwash for a chosen nation ! 
Is such a book the turnpike to salvation ? 
Can such disgusting stuff be deemed ' God's word V 
Or such humgruffins favorites with the Lord ? 
Such filthy cannibals, who hadn't sense 
To hide their unclean things, which gave offence ; 
Till Moses bid them dig a hole and hide 'em,* 
Because the Lord, he said, could not abide 'em ; 
And didn't wish, while lounging in their tents, 
To be regaled with such ambrosial scents : 
For where such lolypops were strew'd about. 
It smelt like modern Athens there's no doubt. 
Oh, Moses, Moses ! wherefore, Mister Moses, 
Did'st thou not in their tansies rub their noses ? 
Since nasty curs, the connoisseurs all say, 
If you repeat the dose, are cured that way. 
'J'hou should'st have served such stinkards puppy fashion,^ 
For putting Goramity in a passion. 
No wonder, worried by such unlick'd bears, 
The Lord so often like a trooper s wears. :]: 



haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walk- 
ing and mincing as they go : therefore the Lord will smite with a scab 
the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, and the Lord will 
discover their secret parts ; and the Lord will take away their rings 
and their jiose-jewels ; and instead of a sweet smell there shall be a 
stink.' — Isaiah iii. 

* * And thou shalt have a paddle upon thy weapon, and it shall be 
when thou wilt ease thyself abroad, thou shalt dig therewith, and shalt 
turn back and cover (very cleanly !) that which cometh from thee.' — 
Exodus xxxii. ' For the Lord thy God walketh in the midst of thy 
camp ; therefore shalt thy camp be holy, that he see no unclean thing 
in thee, and turn away from thee." — Deut. xxiii. 

f St. John the Divine differs in opinion with Mister Moses ; since he 
says, CRev. xxii.) ' He that is filthy let him be filthy still.' 

X ' How long will this people provoke me ?' — Numb. xiv. ' Unto 
whom I sware in my wrath,' &c. 



60 

Angelic Yahoo ! tiiough thy form's divine,* 
Thy intellect denotes thee but a swine : 
Cajoled and fleeced by church and state combin'd, 
Yet proudly prating of thy " march of mind !" 
If trash like this can for religion pass, 
Cudgell'd and kicked thou should'st be for an ass. 

But though the Yahoo with this Bible stuff 
Is to the gullet cramm'd, 'tis not enough 
To stifle reason ; and to garble truth, 
A vampire tribe beset him from his youth ; 
Well knowing if they could not keep him blind, 
They could no longer holy plunder find : 
Hence youth are pestered morning, noon, and eve, 
With ^chart in heavenf, grace, and ' / believe ;'J 
Then, lest the head should be from lumber freed, 
'Tis bother'd with an Athanasian Creed ; 
Hymns, tracts, and liturgies, complete the twaddle. 
And leave the Yahoo a well- furnished noddle. 

But Law contributes, law may claim a share 



^ ' In action how hke an angel.' — Hamlet. 

t Chart in heaven, is the gabble of children morning and evening; 
and snuffled over with their ' / bleve,'' or ' Suffry dunder,' to the great 
edification of the brats, and delight of their parents, who would be hor- 
rified if this unmeaning stuff was once neglected. The grace is snuf- 
fled over, that the Lord may sanctify the prog for their use, and them- 
selves to the Lord's sarvice. (What the Devil sarvice can they render 
the Lord 1) But why is this mummery omitted at breakfast and tea ? 
Are those refreshments not worth thanking the Lord for ? And why 
is not grace said upon certain occasions, at bed time ? Sorely, says 
Voltaire, ' une belle femme vaut bein un souper !' And to beg of the 
Lord to ' sanctify these creatures to our use,' wouM be a very rational 
and appropriate petition at such times. 

t Few governments wish for enlightened subjects, ' Train up a 
child in the way he should go ;' i. e. brutalize him, in order to render 
him abject and subservient, and then upbraid him with his brutality. 
Tie a tin kettle to a dog's tail, and set up the cry of mad-dog, and he 
will soon get his brains knocked out. Priests, from their supposed 
sanctity, have unfortunately acquired such an ascendancy in society, 
that they may be considered as the principal springs and levers in all 
governments. * Church and state' is the general cry (church first, as 
the most influential) ; and it has ever been the grand undeviating max- 
im of the church to 'train up a child in the way he should go.' 



61 

In making godlike Yahoos what they are.* . 

The law and church together are combined, 

And trot on check by jowl, the rest to blind. 

For Church and State bawls every learned brother^ 

And one grand humbug countenances t'other. 

For right or wrong, they plead with equal glee, 

" C'est tout egal," their object is the Fee. 

In all the mummery of gown and wig, 

See on the bench an antiquated prig ; 

ll<^w like a wond'rous oracle he prates-. 

Directing Gotham jury's addled pates ; 

Quotes Coke and Hale, and Littleton and Selden,t 

(All wonders in their day like our great Eldon) 

Who framed wise laws to check the horrid evil 

Of being " instigated by the devil. ":|: 

Oh ! what wise ancestors ! what legislators 1 

Dame Nature surely meant them for bull-baiters. 

Laws upon laws against imagined crimes ; 

As well adapted to ' enlightened' times ! 

Their grave import each learned blockhead feels^ 

By deodands on horses and cart-wheels.^ 

* 'It appears as if the Lamb, alias the blessed Redeemer, had con- 
'celved a very unfavorable opinion of the latitat tribe (who, it is ver^ 
possible, were in his time bnt a shabby set), or he would not have ex- 
pressed himself with such bitterness in speaking of them: for example, 
• And he said, Woe unto you also, ye lawyers ! for ye lade men with 
burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens 
with one of your fingers. Woe unto you, lawyers ! for ye have taken 
iaway the key of knowledge.'— Ltike x. 46.52. 

t In the present so much boasted age of ' intellect,' we hear these 
authorities quoted as prodigies of wisdom and excellence ; yet this 
great Sir Matthew Hale condemned several poor old women^to the 
gallows for witchcraft. 

t The ridiculous fudge from our enlightened ancestors, in the pre- 
amble to all criminal indictments, and still kept up as an illustratiou of 
•the spread. 

§ ' Deodand (deodandum) a thing devoted to God for expiatioa of 
his wrath, or to atone for the violent death of a man by misadven- 
ture.' — Bailey. Jacob's Law Dictionary says, ' given or rather forfeit- 
ed to God for the pacification of his wrath.' Is it any wonder our 
venerable ancestors are so highly extolled ? A poor old woman being 
deaf, or perhaps drunk, is run over by a cart, when the wheel is given 
to the great Jehovah to appease his wrath ! What has provoked his 
wrath ? Oh divine Yahoo ! ' In apprehension how like a god !' 

6 



Ordeals, magic, laws for hanging witches,* 
And throwing women into ponds and ditches f 
For it was soon discovered by their swimming, 
Whether they witches were, or mere old women. 
Then searching them for private teats, to show 
Whether they suckled Beelzebub or no !t 
Wager of battle laws ! and some (what sport !) 
Sent ladies riding on a ram in court IJ 
Stick-chopping sheriffs proving themselves able ; 
And lord mayors counting hobnails on a table ! ^ 



* By the express command of the holy bugaboo, Exod. xxii. 18, and 
Lev. XX. 27, wizards and witches are to be put to death; and upou 
this holy authority the British Solomon founded his Demonology, of 
which ihe following is an extract: 

Question. ' What forme of punyshment thinke ye merites magiciens 
and witches?' 

King. 'They ought to be put to dethe, according to the law of God. 

Qiiest'wn. * But what kynde of dethe I pray you ? 

King. ' It is commonly by fyre. 

Question. ' But ought no sex, age, nor rank to be excused T 

King. ' None at all .' 

So much for the wisdom and humanity of this precious Lord's an* 
iiointed; no wonder he has been held up as a prodigy by the clergy, 
who have always profited by the ignorance and barbarity of the peopie, 
and who still sanction and justify from holy writ, the continuance of 
such atrocities in the remote parts of the country, as far as they are 
able. This royal pitoyable, in the conference at Hampton Court, jab- 
bered so much to the purpose, that Archbishop Whitgift, (who, as 
Ld. Bolingbroke observes, died soon after, and most probably doated 
then,) declared that ' verily the kins: spake by the spirit of God.' It 
appearsfrom some letters in the flarleian Mss. that Jammie had athick 
skull. * They could hardly,' says the letter to Sir Wm. Hollonde, 
* breake it open with a chisel and a saw, and so full of brains, as they 
could not, upon the opening, keep them from spilling; a great proof 
of his infinite judgment.' — Helics of Literature, 226. See Bishop Jew- 
ell's vehement admonition to Queen Elizabeth to prosecute witches 
and sorcerers with severity, from which, and other similar remonstran- 
ces by the church gang, witchcraft aud euehantmeut were made felony 
soon after; and in the year 1612, nineteen poor wretches were tried 
at Lancaster for witchcraft, ten of whom were condemned and exe- 
cuted. 

•' t It was the usual practice to strip the poor women for this purpose ? 
and also to prick them with pins, or scratch them with brambles, to see 
if they would bleed. 

X See this explained in Bailey's Dictionary, word Free-bench. 

§ See an excellent burlesque on the wise laws and customs of our 
ancestors in Goldsmith's 13th Essay. 



63 

Such were our great grand-dads ! what a breed f 
From whom our great mind-marching race proceed. 
No wonder Yahoos boast their genealogy, 
Or rave about the humbug of phrenology ; 
By which great doctors, (Splitskull, Fudge, and Co.) 
From bumps upon the nob can plainly show 
Whether the boy will be a thief or no. 
For if nobs on the sconce so guide the mind, 
The fingers will to pilfering be inclined ; 
Thus destined to the dt'op he cannot shun it. 
The cursed bumps upon his nob have done it. 

Oh, intellect ! how far and wide's thy spread, 
Fermenting in each lubbers lowgerhead. . 
Not only is it shown on skulls by bumps. 
But also in fool's tricks, hops, skips, and jumps ! 
All hail gymnastics ! (ass tricks) what a sight ! 
Boys walking on their heads, their heels upright! 
What joy to see his sons, the parent feels, 
Bending sea-crabs, and turning Cath'rine wheels. 
Will climbing ladders backwards, leaping ditches, 
And playing such fool's antics bring in riches ? 
A money-getting itch 'tis, no doubt, stirs 'em ; 
Oh, brilliant trio ! Voelker, Gall, and Spurzheim !' 
While each one for a prodigy now passes, 
Who'd ever think of " writin«j them down asses ?"* 
Their sapient followers, one and all, indeed. 
Might be set down with truths of long-ear'd breed. 

Hail, glorious age ! when science so abounds, 
That our sea-captains give a dozen pounds 
To purchase a child's caul, as then they knovy 
They can't to Davy Jones's locker go.f 



*. < 



Oh, that he were but hereto write me down an ass.' — Shahspeare 

t Another striking proof of the march ! In the most respectable 
journals, advertisements are every day inserted announcing children's 
cauls for sale, at from £10 to £20 each; which are purchased by cap- 
tains of ships as sure preservatives against drowning ! Bits of scarlet 
rags are also bought by the same wiseacres, cliiefly Greenland captains, 
of old women, supposed witclies in Norway, for the purpose of prqi- 
Q^aiing favorable winds in returning home I 



64 

And when in Norway, seek for some old hag, 
Of whom they buy a slip of scarlet rag ; 
Which being fastened to the vessel's masts, 
Saves the sea-lubbers from all adverse blasts. 

But there's the stage ! does that co-operale, 
And furnish lumber for the Yahoo's pate ? 
Oh yes ! the theatre itself is made 
A kind of hot-bed for the humbug trade ? 
When ghosts and goblins are personified, 
The audience, one and all, are horrified ; 
The "ad captandam vulgus" is a ghost, 
Which touches Yahoo's tender feelings most ; 
Eor tho' siich grim hobgoblins yield delight, 
They at the same time cause a dreadful fright,* 
And strike with terror, more than pulpit prosingj, 
Which lulls the congregation oft tp dozing ; 
Hence parsons all, of every age and size^ 
Are ever puffing Shakspeare to the skies j 
Convinced his pale-faced ghosts with bloody sconces, 
Will cause most terror to priest-ridden dunces. 
Mence Shakspeare mania, every dolt can quote, 
From his pufPd plays, whole sentences by rote : 
While those who hear the ranting, at each line. 
Cry out * How charming !' ' Oh, that's very fine V 

Nor less delighted are the Yahoo rabble. 
To hear the witches round their kettle gabble,t 



* "How odd a single hobgoblin's nonentity, 

Should cause more fear than a whole host's identity.'^ 

Byron. 

t Could any one suppose an audience, boasting their rationaHiy, 
could sit to hear, much more to take delight in, such disgusting gibber- 
ish, hardly fit for a Bartlemy fair mob. 

Very few writers, excepting Eymer and Gobbett, have ventured tQ 
point out the absurdities of the divine bard, which indeed is considered 
as petty treason ; the latter however speaks out boldly. ' After his 
ghosts, witches, sorcerers, fairies and monsters ; after his bombast, and 
puns, and smut, what is it can make a nation admire Shakspeare ? 
What is it that ca» n>ake them call him a divine bard, nine-tenths of 
whose works are made up of such trash as any decent man would be 
ashamed to put his name to? The time will undoubtedly come, when 
the whole of this stuff will, by the natural good sense of the nation, 
be conajgned to everlasting qbUvign.' — Begister, vol. 34^ p. 435. 



■-f 



65 

Of mixing toad and blood of bat together, 

With grease scrap'd from the gallows in hot weather, 

And putting in, with other filth to stew, 

*' Turk's nose, frog's toes, and liver of a Jew." 

Then stirring it nine times to brew up trouble. 

Or in their jargon, " make the hell-broth bubble." 

Is it a wonder hags and ghosts alFright, 

When such bombast is spouted every night.* 

Then while the hags sink down before his eyes, 

To see Macbeth gape up toward the skies, 

And give amidst his " start, and stare, and stagger,"! 

A flying leap to catch the " air drawn dagger !" 

But Banquo's ghost's the thing, Vv^hen pale as death, 

He up the trap-door pops to scare Macbeth ; 

With visage grim^ and stiH" about the crupper," 

He squats down with the quality to supper : 

While they with wonder at each other stare, 

To hear such ranting at an empty chair : 

He's raving at the ghost, (which they don't see,) 

And cries, " Don^t shake your gory locks at me." 

Since superstition rules the Yahoo most. 
There's nothing for the parson like a ghost ; J 
While he can keep his noodles in a fright. 
With ghosts, and devils, all will go on right. 
Is it a wonder then that such a scribe 
Should be a fav'rite with the humbug tribe ! 

That Shakspeare copied Nature is the cry ; 
But Nature may be copied in her sty: 

* See Beaachamp's excellent Analysis, 192. 

t " And strut, and storm, and straddle, stamp and stare." — A line in 
Cowper's Task,, describing players, 

I Every person endeavors to inculcate a belief in ghosts and witches, 
as tending to perpetuate fear and ignorance, their grand and only sup- 
porters. Crabbe confesses their utility, and classes unbelievers with 
rufSans in the true spirit of Christian charity. 

" Each village inn has heard the ruffian boast. 
That he believ'd in neither God nor ghost. — Parish Register. 
All which is riveted by the blessed Jew book, where Samuel's ghost is 
adverted to as a knock you down argument, if you demur. 

6f 



66 

As Voltaire once r^mark'd by his derriere^ 

Which, though 't \v as : Nature, he wrapt up with care. 

Does Nature prompt Othello's blackguard roar. — * 
'' Villain, be sure you, prove my wife a w.hore !"t 
To murder Desdemona, and then tell, Y 
In language Billingsgate can not excel, > 
" She's like a liar gone to burn in helU" 5, 
And can such ribaldry, such vulgar stuiF 
Give pleasure? yes,, 'tis Shali^peare's — that's enough; 
To find fault with, his plays is. petty treason ; 
We must not bring them to the test of reason : 
They're meant, like other precious stuff, for cramming in 
The Yahoo's empty pate without examining. 

Who'd sit to hear such trash as Cymbeline, 
Were it not Shakspeare's ? then its very fine ! 
How poor lachimo must sweat and fume, 
Coop'd in his box, while in the lady's room ! 

* See the excellent remarks upon this Blackamoor's rant in Rymer's 
' Short View of Tragedy,' and also on the absurdities of Shakspeare's 
J^diiis. CcBsar. 

tThe folio wUig lines are in part extracted from the Epilogue to the 
Clandestine Marriage. A party after quitting the card table begin 
discoursing on the plays of Shakspeare : — 

Sir PaVk Ma- ' King Lare's touching ! and how fine to see 
honey. Ould Hamlet's ghost ! To.be or not to be ! 

What arc your op'ras to Othello's roar ? 

Oh, he's an angel of a blackamoor ! 
Lord Milium. What, when he chokes his wife ? 
CoL Trill. And calls her whore 1 

Sir Pat. King Richard calls his horse,— and then Macbeth, 

Who talks of murder till he's out of breath ! 

My blood runs cowld at every syllable ; 
Lord Min. And then he spies a dagger-r- 

Col. Trill. That's invisible ! 

Sir Pat. Oh, botheration! how could he suppose 

A bloody dagger dangled at his nose ? 

And jump to catph it! 
Col. Trill. Had it beeij a dagger 

He might have cut his thumb ! 
Lord Min. And spoil'd his swagger." 

{^All laugh. 
Bee an excellent burlesque of this Tom-a-Biidlam foolery in the 
'Rejected Addresses.' 



67 

Suppose, while biitton'd up for this strange frolic, 
He had been troubled with the windy cholic ! 
How the poor lady in her bed must funk 
At hearing loud explosions in the trunk ! 

Next Shyloclv comes, a cannibal old Jew, 
Who claims a pound of flesh, by bond his due. 
No words his savage rancour can assuage, 
He brings his weights and scales upon the stage ; 
Then whets his knife to cut it in the sight 
Of Christian Yahoos, to their great delight.* 

Behold King Lear, who raves in his oration. 
For musk to sweeten his imagination.f 
Why, what has tainted it ? the reader cries ; 
Ask ladies, who praise ^hakspeare to the skies. 

See Hamlet's hair (or wig) stand bolt upright,}: 
Like quills upon the porcupine, with fright; 
His daddy's ghost comes all in armor drest — 
(A queer ghost's jacket it must be confess'd)^: 
' Angels,' he cries, ' and ministers of grace,' 
In horror at the phantom's povvder'd face : 
But when the bugaboo down stairs has got, 
He cracks his jokes with it — his fright's forgot ; 
And while the spectre under-ground cries ' Swear !' 
Says, ' Ha ! old Truepenny, what, art thou, thqre !' 



* How such henible and disgusting stuff can be delighted in is as- 
tonishing ! It serves. however to keep up animosity, and exasperate 
one class of citizens against another, by w hich they are all more easily 
managed and kept in subjection. Diride and conquer is the grand 
sme quanon of all goyernmentSi 

t * Down from the waist they are ceniaurs, tho' women all above; 
but to the girdle do, the gods inherit, beneatb-is all the fiends. There's 
hell — there's, darkness — there is the sulphurous pit, burning, scalding, 
stench, consumption: fie, fie, fie: pah, pah: give me an ounce of 
civet, good apothecary, to sweeten my imagination !" There's a neat 
genteel speech for royalty to spout. 

t The tragedy performers in Pope's time wore enormous Caxon's; 
Gibber: tells us his jasey cost him forty guineas ! 

" what made the people stare ? 

Cato's great wig." 



68 

These are rough sketches of our fav'rite plays, 
That yield such raptures, and obtain such praise : 
From such choice specimens of Shakspeare's pages, 
Is it a wonder Shakspeare-mania rages ? 
Such fustian hodge-podge, hatch'd from childish tales, 
Where ghosts and hags, and mummery prevails, 
Are well adapted for a Yorkshire fair, 
To make clodhopping bumpkins grin and stare : 
But in this boasted intellectual age. 
To bring such trumpery upon the stage ;• 
In London too, the seat of art and science, 
To set all common sense so at defiance ! 
To puff ' th' immortal bard ' up to the sky,* 
Shows Yahoos are but babes, tho' six feet high ; 
And that 'tis raree-shows they most delight in, 
With Punch and Judy, and the Devil fighting. 

Survey the biped race in ev'ry atate,. 
The rich, the poor, the vulgar and the great;; 
In what class or condition can we trace. 
The " little less than angel" in the race ?t 

* No manufacturer of bombast, or rattle bladder trash, has ever been 
so wonderfully puffed up or extolled as Shakspeare. But as poor 
Sancho observes, ' there's never a why but there's a wherefore.' By 
the vampire tribe he is held up as a prodigy, from the great service he 
has rendered them by his personifications of ghosts and phantoms ; 
and by the Yahoos in general, from hjs having beplastered them so 
neatly! ' Caw me, caw thee;' but hear him, as they cry in a certain 
kennel, when any honorable gentleman is speaking nonsense. 

" What a piece of work is man ! how noble in reason ! [Is not this 
ironical? i?cason, and whitewashing with Iambus blood, do not well 
assimilate.] how infinite in faculties; in form and moving how express 
and admirable ; in action how like a god ! the beauty of the world; 
the paragon of animals!" Bravo, the divine bard. He does the 
thing handsomely, and dabs it on pretty thick, but it all sticks. The 
Yahoo's vanity has stomach for it all. No wonder, after such a lu.s- 
cious iollypop they should dub him divine, and so incessantly bellow 
forth his wonderful knowledge of human nature. Blarney for ever ! 

t It is much to be regretted that Pope has not explained to us what 
angels were. It would have amused us to know how they spend their 
time when they have done singing and trumpeting ; whether they fly 
about with their goose wings stuck on their shoulders, what are their 
wants, and how they are gratified ; whether they eat and drink, &c. ; 
and whether, if they do, it all transpires in ambrosial perspiration ; or 
whether there's a necessity for a " wha wants me ?" — See Martinus 
Scriblei'us, chap. 7. 



69 

But what are angels ? lubbers with goose wings ! 
What nonsense, a great poet sometimes sings. 

See the poor sailor dragg'd out like a dog, 
To murder, or be murdered, for king Log.* 
On board a floating-heir he's hauled to fight, f 
And neither knows nor cares who's wrong or right : | 
He takes his quid and grog, and damns his eyes, 
Till by a chain-shot cut in two he dies.. 
Or see the martial hero glory seek, 
Urg'd on by fame, and eighteen-pence a week :^ 

* ' I own,' says Chesterfield to his son, 'that I have a great regard 
for king Lpg.' 

t Black floating hells was the name given by the Americans to our 
men of-war, during the Revolntion, — in which they so happily suc- 
ceeded. . 

t Copenhagen and Navarino, for example. 

§ ' Ou trouver des hommes qui pour 5 on 6 sous par jour affrontent 
dans les combats, la raort, ou les maladies, s'ils avoient ]e sens com- 
nuin.' The pay of the Russian cut-throat.s is about 2s. 6d. per month. 
— See Erasme de la Folic, p. 45. 

" One to destroy is murder by the law, 
And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe ; 
To murder thousands takes a specious name, 
W ?^r's glorious art, and gives immortal fame. — Young. 
For a true portrait of the Yahoo in all his brilliancy and godlike he- 
roism, the reader is referred to the description of the battle between 
the two frigates, in Lieutenant Smith's '^Sailor's and Saints," where 
he is delineated in the full indulgence of his butchering propensity, 
covered with gore and glory. Surely the Yahoo must smell of blood 
in the next world, if he is not well scoured with the soap-suds of re- 
generation, and purified by the " new birth unto righteousness." 
What can the Devil want such blood-bounds for ? Mais taisez-vous — 
they're jo/Zz/ tars. 

' The cunning of mankind,' says Arbuthnot, ' never exerts itself so 
much as in their arts of destroying one another.' — See Sicift's Brob- 
dignag, chap. 7, where their ingenuity in this particular is well des- 
cribed. 

' Les plus honnetes gens apprirent a compter parmi leurs devoirs 
cehji d'egorger leurs semblables ; on vit les hommes se massacrer par 
milliers sans savoir pourquoi.' — Rosseau. 

" For soldiers, if they thought aright, 
Would all as soon be damn'd as fight 
For kings, who, when they've lost a leg, 
Will hardly give 'em leave to beg." — Homer Burlesqued, 



70 

With colors flying they all march in order, 

Told by the parson " killing is no murder." 

Thousands of strutting godlike Yahoo heroes 

March out to fight, to please two royal Nero's ; 

Who wallow in their styes, while these trainM brutes 

Are sacrificed to settle their disputes ; 

And when one-half are killed, the other boasts, 

How much they're succor'd by the ' Lord of Hosts.' 

One side ' Te-deums sings, and so does t'other ;* 

The Lord has help'd king Log, and king Log's brother.f 

' God's images' by thousands are at once 

Killed off J to please a ' Lord's annointed' dunce !. 

A dunce anointed ! Can legitimates 

Have, like their stupid subjects, wooden pates T 

Yes ; blocks alike, they're tutored all by priests \\ 

The only diff'rence is, they're royal beasts : 

Their skulls are stuff 'd the same with fee-faw-fum, 

With hocus-pocus, II hell, and kingdom-come. 

But still such monarchs, tho' with wooden nobs^ 
Are suited best to wooden-headed mobs,*^ 

* " That like the Briton and the Gaul, 

Both sides may sing, and roar, and bawl, 

Te Deum, iho' fpr npwgh.t at ait; 

And tell the Lord a, cursed lie,. 

That both have got the victory."^ — Homer Burlesqued. 

t In all epistolary correspondence between the Lord's annointed, 
they always subscribe themselves royal brothers. 

t " Killed off" was the usual laconic unfeeling answer of Mr. Wind- 
ham, then secretary at war, when questioned as to the great deficien- 
cies in the returned skeleton regiments from America. A proof how 
heroes are appreciated when they can no longer stand to be shot at. 

§ 'Malheur aux nations qui confient I'education de leur citoyens 
aux pretres,' says Helvetius. ' Beaucoup mieux vaudroit ne leur en 
donner aucune.' To which may be added the observation of Gold- 
smith — ' The countries where sacerdotal instruction alone is permitted, 
remain in ignorance, superstition, and slavery.' 

IJ A corruption of ' hoc est corpus meum,' a part of the sacrament 
gabble: for the consolation of idiots, alias Christians, who make no 
doubt of being hugg'd in Abraham's bosom, if they chew a bit of the 
Lord's body, by way of quid, to comfort themselves with, as they jog 
along from ' this ere world to that ere.' 

^j "How goes the mob ? (for that's a mighty thing,) 

When the king's trump the mob are for the king." — Drxjden. 



71 

Who roar and stretch their ell-wide jaws, and sing 

For any royal do-lt, ' God save the king !' * 

It matters not, tho' made of rotten stuff, 

If he's the ' Lord's anointed,' that's enough. f 

A jackass, 'dizen'd out in robes of state, 

Ijet an archbishop but anoint his pate. 

And dub him sacred, soon would be ador'd — 

The Yahoo mob would hail him ' sovereign lord ;' 

Most humbly they'd profess themselves to be 

The vassals of his gracious majesty ; '\. 

A lubber only fit the crows to scare, 

Or carry guts to feed a hungry bear : 

Clap but a tinsel bauble on his sconce, 

His imperfections vanish all at once i^ 

He's God's vicegerent, and by right divine 

Can at his pleasure flog his herd of swine. 

The Jews, we're by the Lord's lieutenant told,[} 
Worshipp'd a calf, that Aaron made, of gold ;^ 



* "Well, if the king's a lion, at the least. 
The people are a many-headed beast." Pope. 

t "What the Lord sends us surelj must be good, 
Although 'tis but a piece of rotten wood." Pindar. 

t If any one of these sacred noodles vouchsafes to open iiis royal 
mouth, whatever he utters must be gracious, forsooth ! Yes, most 
gracious; although it should be a recommendation to a gang of para- 
sites to strip the last shirt from off the backs, and the last penny from 
the pockets of his loving, swinish subjects, to enable gingerbread-gilt 
trumpeters to wear laced jackets at £70 a piece! Is there neither 
shaiiie nor common sense any where but in America 1 

^ " Prendi uom rozzo e comun, fanne un monarca, 
Tosto il favor del ciel sopra gli piove; 
Tosto divien di sapienza un'arca; 
Nella testa di lui s'alloggia Giove : 
Decide, ordina, giudica: un oracolo 
Tutto a un tratto divien: pare un miracolo." CastL 

11 Moses is so designated by Hobbes. 

^ ' And I said unto them, whosoever hath any gold, let them break 
it off; so they gave it me : then I cast it into the fire, and there came 
out this calf" Exod. xxxii. ' And he (Moses) said unto theuj, Put 
every man his sword by his side, and go through the camp, and slay 
every man his brother, and every man his companion. And they did 



72 

For which, as in the holy book Jtis written, 

'i'hree thousand of the snipcock race were smitten. 

While Aaron 'scap'd ! Just as in modern times, 

The great remain unpunish'd for their crimes.* 

But do not Christian Yahoos every day 

To golden calves their adoration pay ?t 

The gin-drench'd rabble always will adore 

The titled, lordly crew, who keep them poor 4 

With equal admiration they all stare 

At Spain's dolI-dresser,§ or a Russian bear ; 

Or hug a filthy, stinking Cossack, |j rot 'em, 

And run to hell to kiss a royal bottom.'IF 



so according to the word of Moses; and there fell of the people that 
day about 3000 men.'— Ibid. 

'And the Lord plagned the people, because they made the calf which 
Aaron made.' — Ibid. This is as clear as mud ; but the ghost in many 
instances, seemed a thick-skulled one at inditing. 

*" Small rogues in hempen ropes oft swing, 
While great ones gain a red silii string : 
The trade islearn'd in half an hour, 
To spare the rich and flog the poor." Homer Burlesqued. 

t " Fools that we are, like Israel's fools of yore, 
The calf ourselves have fashion'd we adore: 
But should true reason once resume her reign, 
The god will dwindle to a calf again.' — Churchill. 

t"The dustman in his cart that hourly slaves, 
Drawn by an ass, the partner of his toils, 
Is far superior to such titled knaves, 

In coaches glitt'ringwith a nation's spoils." — Pindar. 

$ This \ra]y pitoyable ' Lord's annointed' amused himself, during hh 
eaptivity in France, in working muslin petticoats for a wooden doli, 
called the Virgin Mary ! A specimen of royal intellect. 

II The savage who came to exhibit himself after Bonaparte's defeat 
in Russia, when thousands went to gape at him in Hyde Park, and 
other public places, as a prodigy. 

^ " E quel : fu giusto ognor creduto e detto, 
Che il suddito al sovran la zampa lecchi 
Di dipendenza in segno e di rispetto ; 
Ma se la zampa a far leccar ti secchi, 
Farti altre parti anche leccar tu puoi: 
Tutti ti leccheran quel che tu vuoi." — Castit 



73 

Whoe'er would witness folly's highest sport, 
Let him behold a collar-day at court :* 
Whoe'er would see Tom-fools, may here find plenty ; 
For one they'll see elsewhere, they'll here find twenty , 
See ' kingat-arms,' in all their buckram state ! 
What stars and ribands on the childish great If 
What illustrissimos and excellencies ! 
Hung round with colored strings, to please their fancies ! 
What lacquer'd puppets ! what a raree-show !j; 
Are these the ' Tiddydolls' to whom we bo>^ ? 
See Lady Squab among the doll^drest group ^ 
Is that a Yahoo with that monstrous hoop ? 
The upper half preserves the likeness still, 
The lower has been thro' the flaiting-mill. 
Use reconciles us to such uncouth shapes. 
Or we should laugh to see such human apes. 
What starch-phizz'd, poker-back'd, fine dukes and lords ! 
Lisping their pretty namby-pamby words ! 
This nincompoop's dubb'd royal — that serene ;§ 
But what does such slop-dawdle nonsense mean ? 
How do these lordships, highnesses, and graces. 
Refrain from laughing in each other's faces ? 



* A collar day is a festival when the knights wear their collars of 
SS. round their necks as ornatneuts.^— jBai^ey. , 

t " L'opinion et le prejuge viennent a bout de faire passer |)oor 
une decoration honorable, les signes les plus pueriles, et les plus ridi- 
cules." — Da Marsais. 

t " You must renounce courts," says Lord Chesterfield, " if you will 
not connive at knaves and tolerate fools ; their number makes them 
considerable. ' 

" But how, my muse, canst thou refuse so long. 
The bright temptation of the courtly throng ? 
The most inviting theme : — the court affords 
Much food for satire; it abounds in lords." — Young. 

^" Ce monde est un grand Bal, ou des Fous deguises, 
Sous des risibles noms d'emiuence, et d'altesse, 
Pensent enfler leur etre ethausser leur bassesse." 

Voltaire. 
" Hast thou, Osun, beheld an emptier sort, 
Than such as swell this bladder of a court; 
Such painted puppets, such a varnished race, 

Of hollow gewgaws, only dress and face !" — Doniie. 
1 



74 

Such things that glitter like gilt gingerbread, 
Should be with pap,* or else with kava fed.f 
'Tis strange that those who manage court affairs, 
Should not provide them clouts and cacking chairs. 

Yes, this parade forms all the courtier's joys : 
This royal baby-house of dress'd up toys.J 
Lord Farilebury ; Duke of Puddledock ; 
Prince Cacafogo ; Countess Dillicock ; 
Lord Nincompoop ; Sir George Golumpus Grub ; 
Veldt Marshal Hoggsgutz ; Lady Trulhbub ; 
Count Snickasnee ; Lord Fudge ; Prince Potowouskin ; 
Baron Bumfodder ; Monsieur Mouschkin Poushkin ;§ 
Lord Blalh'rumskate ; Earl Swipes ; Count Doodledoo ; 
Madame Caca-du-Dauphin Baisemoncul ; || 
The Rev'rend Noodle Doodle Dunderhead ; 
The Honorable Simon S . . . abed ; 
And Co. ; for of them there's a numerous pack ; 
But these may serve as samples of the sack. 

Lo ! grandeur gives a feast : Oh, all ye gods, 
Who peep down now and then from your abodes ; 

*" O folly, worthy of the nurse's lap, 

Give it the breast, or cram it's mouth with pap." — Coicpcr. 

t Kava is a liquor in high estimation in the South Sea islands, and 
is almost the exclusive beverage of the kings and royal tribes. It is 
made from the root of the pepper tree ; which, after being chewed by 
the natives, and the juice spit into a large bowl, is diluted with water." 
— See Cook's Voyages. 

+ "Round let us bound, for this is punch's holiday, 

Glory to Tom-foolery — huzza, huzza !" — Rejected Addresses. 

It is hardly possible to caricature this childish stuff, or give an ouire 
description of such full-grown babyism. Swift speaks of a tiddidol 
assemblage, where he was introduced. The queen fbrandy Nan j, he 
says, stood in the middle of the circle, simpering and biting the edge of 
her fan ; and looking, like an idiot, by turns at the drest-up dolls who 
were standing all round the room, like so many images. 

§ The name of the Russian ambassador thirty or forty years ago. 

II The dresses worn by all the ladies of rank and fashion some years 
ago, in that .sink of vice and folly, Paris, were actually of this delicate 
color, at least as near as the dyers could match it — out of respect to the 
rmtal excrement. 



75 

Say, had ye ever up stairs in the sky, 

Aught in the guttling way with this to vie ?* 

Tho' at your sumptuous banquets with your goddesses, 

Ye sat so cosy, without breech or bodices ;t 

When Avere ye at your gormandizings able 

To sport a river on your dining-table ? 

Where, ail amongst the gold and silver dishes, 

Shoals could be seen of gold and silver fishes ! 

And all alive O ! — not like fish-fag's sprats, 

Fit only to be given to the cats. 

Yes, all alive ! tho' childish it may seem, 

And bona fide swimming in the stream : 

While noble lords and ladies, in amaze, 

Upon the river and the fishes gaze. 

' What taste !' cries Lord Fopdoodle ; ' c'est unique !' 



* At Carlton House, some years ago. 

t The celestials were certainly very deficient in this respect, as many 
of them were nearly in querpo at their grand assemblies, where the 
Hebes and Ganymedes handed the nectar about. When breechcis 
came first in use, is not exactly known. Moses was permitted to see 
the &acA; parts of the great I AM ; but we are not informed whether 
breeched or not. Adam is said to have worn green breeches ; but that 
is meant merely as a witticism. Neither can we suppose Mister Noah 
wore inexpressibles, as in that case there would have been nothing for 
his son to have laughed at. The " man after God's own heart" was 
evidently bare about the dock, v»^hen he kicked up his heels and caper- 
ed before the ark ; since his wife ragged him for exposing his tackle to 
the maidens, and for which be said they would honor him.* That pro- 
phets were also of the sans culotte order is notorious; since Isaiah, one 
of the most celebrated, tramped about three years with his buttocks 
bare : not to mention many other instances in the holy Jew-book.— 
Homer speaks of breeches where Dr. Macshane attends the poor cuc- 
kold who is wounded in the posteriors by an arrow : since he tells us, 
" The arrow's head, and greasy leather 
Breeches, both came off together." — Iliad, book 4. 
But whether the word guhmuh, in the original, means breeches or not, 
is disputed ; the learned disciples of the profound doctors, Parr and 
Person, differing in opinion : some asserting the true meaning to be 
f — ting crackers; others insist on a — e-case being the genuine transla^ 
tion ; while a third class of deep etymologists are equally positive that 
galligaskins is the true signification of the Greek word. 

" Who shall decide when doctors disagree?" 
And thus must this important matter be left ignoramus. 

* And of the maid servants which thou hast spoken of; of them shall I be 
Lad in honor. — 2 Sam. vi. 



76 

' Par Dieu !' exclaims Lord Froth, ' c'est magnifique !^ 

' C'est bien joli !' sputters out another, 

And one tom-fool still echoes to his brother. 

The ladies too, while munching up their dinners, 

Ask if the fish are pricklebacks, or minnows I 

For those who were not near the river's brim, 

Could not see how the little fishes swim,* 

And frisk, ' and vaggle all their pretty tails :'t 

Not to please ' baby Charles,' but booby Wales i 

Oh, grand celestials ! Jupiier and Co., 

Say, had ye ever such a raree-show ? 

The "Lord's annointed" used, in times of old, 
To keep a fool to laugh at, as we're told ; 
But now so many fools of lords are made,| 
Tom isn't wanted — they have spoiled his trade. 
Provided with so choice a tom-fool train, 
To keep an extra fool would be in vain ; 
With titled fools 'twould be mere waste of money — 
Tom-fool at court's, like sugar-sauce to honey. 
Yet Tom's the most diverting ; courtly fools 
Are dress'd up dolls, who speak and move by rules ; 
Drill'd, strutting things, who scorn all mirth and jokes, 
And never sport a grin like vulgar folks : 
Laughter their buckram grandeur would destroy ; 
That way the " mob express their silly j:0y."§ 



* From the very crowded assemblage it may be supposed many of 
the ladies of quality were too distant from the margin of the river to 
peep in and ascertain the quality of the water animals. 

t " Teazing made easy." 

^ " Nature exclaim'd with wonder — lords are ihingS, 
Which, never made by me, were made by kings." 

Churchill. 

^ " Loud laughter," says Chesterfield, "is extremely inconsistent 
with good manners: it is only the illiberal and noisy testimony of the 
joy of the mob at some very silly thing." And to the same tune singeth 
Lord Froth: "there is nothing," says this noble lord, " more unbe- 
coming a man of quality than to laugh : it is such a vulgar expression 
of the passion ! Every body can laugh." — See the Double Deakr. 

Even Bob, the doctor, since his apostacy, has affected the conse- 
quence of these highborn prigs, and joined the smirking coxcomb 



77 

Grand fools are stuff 'd with " manieres and graces," 
Which surely makes amends for vacant faces. 

Of all the stupid follies brought from France, 
The most disgusting is the ' minuet' dance. 
The poor automaton, with silly face, 
Sprawls round its arms and legs, and calls it grace ! 
Now here, now there, affectedly it swings, 
And seems a toyman's doll, on wheels and springs. 
A glorious feat to swell the Yahoo's pride, 
By which he's so completely monkeyfied ! * 

Oh, Chesterfield, thou most illustrious scribe ! 
First fiddle of the a-la-puppy tribe ! 
The world must surely deem it a disaster, 
That thou wert not brought up a dancing-master ; 
The prince of capering coxcombs, great Marcel,! 
Could not have taught the " graces" half so well ; 
Altho', like thee, he studied hiensemice, 
And was a true bred Fribble, born in France. 
How hast thou wrote, and wrote again, about it, 
Tho' a respected Hottentot did flout it,:|: 
With trash like this did'st thou take wondrous pains, " 
To cram thy son's skull with, instead of brains. 
How did'st thou scribble letter after letter, 
But never found poor Phil§ a jot the better : 
For — oh, ye gods, 'tis shocking to relate, 
When at a dinner-party, in grand state, 
He ate his cherry pie, then licked his plate ! |i 

tribe in their contempt of every thing vulgar. "Laughter," he ex- 
claims, "is di 'plebeian emotion; nothing beyond a silent and transitory 
simper should be indulged in by the refined ranks !" — Omniana. One 
should suppose the laureat was ironing us, as Mrs. Slipslop terras it. 

* Alfieri said he could never be taught by a French dancing-master, 
whose art made him at once shudder and laugh. " If we reflect," says 
Mr. D'Israeli, " that, as it is now practised, it seems the art of giving 
affectation to a puppet, and that this puppet is a man, we can enter 
into this mixed sensation of degradation and ridicule." 

t A celebrated dancing master at Paris. 

t Lord Chesterfield's appellation of the great moraHst. 

§ Philip Stanhope. 

II Said to be a fact. 

7g 



78 

Such are " God's images" among the great ; 
The " lords of reason," puff'd with wealth and state. 
But take your specimens from Mutton -lane, 
Or Rotten-row,* and then be proud and vain. 
Search Billingsgate, Saint Gile's, and Rag Fair, 
And say what angel forms you meet with there ; 
View them in dens where poverty prevails, 
Or perishing in hospitals and jails ; 
See the poor cinder sifter's filthy rags, 
And chimney-sweepers, with their sooty bags ; 
A prey to squalid want, disease and vermin, 
(And thousands there are such for one in ermine). 
Do these poor wretches, who eat husks like swine, 
Display the boasted " human face divine ?"t 
Are " godlike heroes" found in their abodes ? 
O no ! 'tis wealth makes Yahoos demi-gods ; 
Of godlike qualities the poet sings, 
But then they appertain to lords and kings. 
Oh what a blest soul-gifted, sky-born race, 
Sweeps in " God's image," and in Mudlark's grace ! 
In scavengers you " lords of reason" meet ; 
Vociferating " dust-ho" through the street ! 
" Creation's lords" divinely play their part, 
And lift the fragrant bucket to the cart ; 
In spite of filth, immortal souls you trace. 
Which glitter through the dirty shirt and face ; 

And though they stink, and have Tom dmen's looks, 

They'll in the next world all be lords and dukes. J 

Inflated Yahoo ! boast your blessed state. 
Millions in rags and dirt — a few styled great ;§ 



^ Dens of misery ia the vicinity of Glerkenwell, which with Ofaick- 
lane and Black-boy Alley, will be in all probability swept away by the 
l^roposed new street from Fleet Market to Islington. 

* Paradise lost. 

t Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 
Matt. V. 3. 

X Lord Byron has observed, that the world (speaking of England) 
eeems only made for a i&vf thousands called quality, or rank a^nd fash- 
ion, as the VVest-enders are denominated. 



79 

But still they've so much feeling for each other, 
My Lord Duke owns the Sweep his CAm^zan-brother 
And though the poor are fed with fee-faw-fum, 
They'll get a greasy chin in *' kingdom come." 

Who would not give five pounds to treat a lord ? 
Though for a single peach, 'tis not absurd : 
But give five shillings to the poor for bread, 
Oh ! that's disgraceful — up stairs they'll be fed, 
And here perhaps it may not be amiss, 
To add a fable in parenthesis ; 
A proverb even, if it comes in pat, 
As Sancho tells the Don, is verbum sat. 

A fox once met an ape, as iEsop says. 
And chatter'd as they used in former days ; 
When, after compliments, the ape thus cried — 
" I wish, kmd Sir, you'd peep at my backside : 
You'll own I've little reason to be glad, 
Considering my rump's so poorly clad. 
I have'nt got a tail that's worth a rush, 
While you've a superfluity of brush ; 
And could you but a little morsel spare, 
To cover my poor buttocks, now so bare, 
I certainly should take it very kind. 
As then I should be comme il faut behind." 
" God zounds !" quoth Reynard, flying in a passion. 
An ape, forsooth ! and would be dress'd fox-fashion ! 
A very pretty joke for plebs like thee 
To dizen out, and think to rival me ! 
No, no, my brush may trail along the ground, 
But not an atom of it shall be found 
To decorate the riff'-rafi', my inferiors ; 
Much more to hide a stinking ape's posteriors.'*^ 

This fable to the Yahoo may apply, 
As any one will see with half an eye ; 
" Id est," if he has " quantum suflf." of brain : 
And now we'll to our moutons* turn again. 

* Rabelais. 



80 

Folly and vice by turns the Yahoo rule. 
Sometimes the knave prevails, sometimes the fool. 
Actions that often are considered good, 
Base would be found, the motive understood :* 
His life's a counterfeit, a masquerade,! 
And cant and rank hypocrisy a trade. 
With artificial phiz he acts a part, 
And all through life his tongue belies his heart :| 
" Volto sciolto," says my lord to Phil,^ 
" Ma pensieri stretti," mind that still. 
His character completely would you know, 
Read Swift, and Mandeville, and Rochefoucault.|| 
Observe yon black-dress'd Yahoos, what grimace ! 
Mirth in the heart, and sorrow in the face ; 
What signs of woe, crape hat-bands, solemn walk, 
Exteriors dismal — hearts as light as cork.Tf 

* "All the virtues that have ever been in mankind," says Swift, 
" may be counled upon a few fingers; but their follies and vices are 
innumerable, and time.adds hourly to the heap." And what says bro- 
ther parson of the present day ? " The world and almost every thing 
in it are capable of being abused by man, whose corrupt propensities 
are continually leading him to poison the sources of his own happi- 
ness. — Sumner. 

t " Our life is a false nature — 'tis not in 
The harmony of things." Byron. 

X Nous aurions souvent honte de nos plus belles actions, si le monde 
voyait tous les motifs qui les produisent." — Rochefoucalt. 

§ See " Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his Son," to qualify him for 
the beau-monde. 

II The proceedings of the good, honest church-going Yahoos to- 
wards each other, are truly described by Mandeville in the story of 
the two sugar merchants, letter B in the Fable of the Bees, verifying 
the Italian proverb, 

" Con Arte ed Inganni si vive il mezzo anni ; 
Conlnganni e con Arte si vive I'altre parti." 
" What think you," says Horace Walpole, " of the cruelty and villany 
of European settlers ; but this very morning 1 found that part of the 
purchase of Maryland from the savage proprietors, (for ice do not 
massacre, we are such good Christians as only to cheat), was a quantity 
of red lead and a parcel of jews'-harps." — WalpoWs Correspondence. 
" Ovunque il guardo osservator tu giri, 
Scorticatori e scorticati miri : 
Gl'imbelli il forte, ed i babbei lo scaltro, 
E insomma ognun che pu6, scortica I'altro." — Casti. 

H " Heredis fletus sub person^ risus est." 



81 

A gouty friend (oh, what delightful luck,) 
Has left the world, and left them all his muck. 
Heart-broken they must seem, and in a tone 
Of whining, tell you of their dear friend gone. 
In sables then they're deck'd from top to toe, 
That every one their great distress may know : 
And while in canting strain they seem to grieve, 
(What mockery) they're laughing in their sleeve.* 

But the grand farce is when a monarch dies — 
A butch'ring Harry, or a George the wise ; 
A royal Tiger, or a royal Neddy ; 
No matter which, the scutcheOns are got ready ; 
The carcass lays in state, with mutes and lights ; 
For loyal subjects love such pretty sights. 
Crushing each other's ribs in crowds they go, 
Though full of grief they long to see the show. 
And when the royal carrion's in the tomb, 
The undertaker's garb they all assume ; 
The grov'ling crew throughout the royal nation, 
Show outward signs of inward lamentation. 
At church, at play-house, and at public shows, 
The *' lords of reason" all as black as crows, 
Look as if Nick had shook his soot-bag o'er 'em, 
To make them like himself — for black's decorum. 
Hence Latitats and Parsons when they clack, 
Out of respect to Nick, are dress'd in black ; 
For though these long-robed gentry all pretend 
To hate Old Blackey, he's their dearest friend. 
(Were Yahoos free from vice they would not want 
The lawyer's jargon, or the parson's cant.)t 

* " In all civil societies men are taught insensibly to be hypocrites 
from their cradle ; nobody dares to own that he gets by public calami- 
ties, or even by the loss of private persons. The sexton would be 
stoned should he wish openly for the death of the parishioners; tho' 
every body knew he had nothing else to live upon." — Search into So- 
ciety, 402. May not the same be said of doctors and physicians, who 
profess to be very glad when they meet their friends and acquaintance 
in good health. 

t ' Why were laws made, but that we are rogues by nature.' — Shalc- 
speare. 

After all the blarney of the immortal bard about the Yahoo's perfec- 



82 

I 
Tis true, they call him dragon, serpent, shark ; 

But then they shake hands with him in the dark. 

Now Old Nick's black in grain, a knowing prig, 
Who hides his horns and tail with gown and wig ;* 
And meeting with young Chipf (the Lamb) one day, 
He v/hipt him on his back, and flew away : 
Then in a wilderness for forty days,J 
He tried to diddle him in various ways ; 
With promised kingdoms, if he would adore him, 
And hoo respectfully, and fall before him. 
But Chippy, though a Lamb, was not a flat, ^ 
For through the gown and wig he smelt a rat, > 
So neither made a leg, nor doff'd his hat ; ) 

But cried, " I smell your brimstone, master Nick ; 
You're after playing me some shabby trick : 
Don't think with your palaver you can blind me, 
But hold your jaw, my cock, and get behind me." § 

Ben Johnson says, that Beelzebub an ass is,|| 
Though for a conjurer with fools he passes ; 
And sure he proved himself a Johnny Raw, 
To let young Chippy thus slip through his paw : 



lions, who could have thought he would have let the cat out of the 
bag, and like the Satyr in the fable, ' blow hot and cold with the same 
mouth.' 

^ " To hinder him from being known, 
He borrowed parson Sqnintum's gown ; 
These kind of robes, his godship knew, 
Hide rogues the best, and roguery too." 

Homer Burlesque. 

t The carpenter's son. 

t ' Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be 
tempted of the devil ; and when he had fasted forty days and forty 
nights, he was afterwards an hungered. Again the devil taketh him 
up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the king- 
doms of the world, and the glory of them : and saith unto him, All 
these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.' 
—Matt. iv. 

§ And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Sa- 
tan." — Lukeiv. 

II Comedy of ' The Devil's an Ass.' 



83 

And after, wlien, as Christian creeds all tell, 

He had him three days in his claws in hell ; 

Yet, like a blockhead, let him scamper out, 

When he a treaty might have made no doubt. 

With such a first-rate prisoner in limbo, 

He might have strutted with his arms a-kimbo : 

Not only haggled for his liberation, 

But have released his staff from their damnation ! 

Yet who can judge for this proud cock ? they say, 

That every one has some odd whim or way. 

*' De gustibus non disputandum est," 

He might think his warm corner much the best ; 

Where he could smoke his pipe, and swill his toddy^ 

Nor longer care a fig for any body. 

He had had trumpeting enough be-fore, 

Blasting and pufling till his throat was sore ; 

And now preferr'd, bored with their " holy, holy," 

The Bumble-puppy game, and Rolly-polly. 

But this is all digressive — we'll go back 

To where we lalk'd of Yahoos wearing black. 

Young Chip it seems smelt Nick,' and did'nt mind him, 

But snubb'd him well, and bid him get behind him. 

While to commemorate this dire event, 

Christians wear charcoal-colored clothes in Lent : 

Nor dare they then taste any luscious dish. 

But snufile grace o'er parsnips and salt fish ; 

While on Black Friday, by saints nick-nam'd Good, 

Buns, gallows-marked, are deemed soul-saving food :* 

Till, penance over, Easter brings delight. 

And then they gorge and guzzle day and night. 

Thus six months past (the grieving time requir'd 
For kings), the Yahoos of their black get tir'd ; 
The mockery no longer is display'd — 
They then find out that " it makes bad for trade," 



* Notwithstanding the spread, and the stream, and march ofintdkd, 
and the so much boasted enlightened age, there is scarcely a family in 
England in which this superstitious and degrading mummery is omit- 
ted on what is called Good Friday, when the streets resound with the 
cries of Hot Cross Btins ! But hogs delight in garbage. 



84 

Besides, although he was the " best of kings," 

They're not to fret their guts to fiddle-strings. 

So grief adieu — a royal chamberlain 

Says, " Neddy's put your gaudy's on again." 

Th' obsequious herd, impatient of delay. 

Resume their fripp'ry, and as larks are gay, 

Proud to show off in this lickspittle farce, 

And mourn a Nero, or a royal ass. 

In black, or colors, still they're strutting seen, 

Puff'd with conceit, and proud of being mean. 

For, though it seems a paradox, 'tis true. 

The self-same Yahoo's mean and haughty too ; 

With vices opposite he's doubly curst, 

" Meanness that soars, and pride that licks the dust." 

Observe that buckram, whisker-jawed, queer thing, 
He's called a " lord in waiting" to the King ; 
And when his majesty's dispos'd to stir. 
This thing sticks to his crupper like a bur : 
Whether the monarch marches fast- or slow. 
Just the same pace this lackey-lord must go ; 
And at the play-house, when the King goes there. 
Skip-kennel stands upright behind his chair : 
Scarce daring, while he stands in stiff-rump'd state, 
To turn from side to side his empty pate : 
Abject, yet proud, a mixty-maxty thing ; 
But very fit to wait upon a king. 
Among the court-gang crawling like a toad, 
A three-tailed bashaw in his own abode : 
An abject reptile in the drawing room ; 
At home, the tyrant's manner he'll assume : 
A very Bobadil, a Bully-back ; 
But when at court, he sails on t'other tack : 
Booing and cringing, none so mild and meek. 
Not brother Bruin then, but Jerry Sneak. 

God made man in his image, parsons teach. 
When Old Nick came next day and kick'd his breech ; 
And, being " maitre Charlatan," alas ! 
Soon goi God's image bundled out to grass. 



. 85 

For he was in a garden placed at first, 

Till by the snake's contrivance he was curs'd. 

(The quomodo has been before related, 

Where madam Eve was found to be soft-pated.) 

And claiming still the Yahoo as his prize, 

This devil-snake we now apostrophize. 

O, thou infernal omnipresent dragon !* 
A mighty feat it is for thee to brag on, 
To gull a naked nincompoopish couple, 
By coaxing them to eat a bit of apple. 
Thou sooty, smutty, worst of bugaboo's, 
Who's at the Yahoo's heels where'er he goes ; 
Whether call'd Old One, Nick, or Scratch, or Devil, 
'Tis thou that dost incline his heart to evil. 
Not only hast thou dosed him wtUl with prid^, 
But most of thy good qualities beside. 
Had it not been for thee, thou ugly toad, 
This world of our's had been a snug abode ; 
But since thou trottest night and day about, 
In ev'ry corner poking thy damn'd snout, 
The Yahoo's never safe, but ev'ry minute 
Finds something wrong, and cries * the devil's in it.' 
The Lord, we're told, once cramm'd thee in thy den, 
Then, who the devil let thee out again ?t 
But 'tis no use for us to growl and grumble, 
If fated, in thy clutches we must tumble. 
Does not the saint of saints, the frenzied Paul, % 



* Would not the omnipresence of the black monarch, since he is 
universally acknowletiged as a Ubiqnitaiian, be an excellent subj est 
for the pen of an evangelical fustian scribbler? 

t " To credit such idle whims," says the Indian, " is an affront to ihe 
great Spirit, as it charges him with authorizing mischief, by being the 
direct author of all the disorders and wickednesses in the world, by 
sutferinglhe evil spirit to get out of hell," — Lahonton's Voyage, 

t " How little did those people think, who saw 
The fir.st appearance of" this crooked lout; 
Who saw this same disturber of the law, 

When first from town to town he rov'd about 

8 



86 

insinuate that we're predestinated all,* 
'^rom birth, the chosen few aloft to go, 
The many sous'd into the pit below ? f 
The sheep elected, all cran'd up to heaven ; 
The goats rejected, down to hell are driv'n.| 
But let us leave this jargon to the schools : 
To rev'rend prigs who dub each other fools. 
They'll solve such mysteries beyond a doubt, 
And where there is no meaning, find one out ; 
Prove that it's dark at noon, and light at night, 
And tho' all's wrong, ' whatever is, is right." 
Prate about ' trees of life,' and ' trees of knowledge,' 
(Else wherefore go such loggerheads to college,)^ 
What Paul saw when he up to heaven was skipping; 
And why he mags so much on cfooc//e-snipping.|| 

Ah; little did they think* how deep the root, 
How far 'twas doom'd to spread, how curs'd the fruit. 
* * * * * 

" Yet so it is ; a Paul has liv'd and died ; 

A curs'd religion has sprung up, and rent 
The world with factiotis— men have fought and pray'd 

As with one breath: their energies they've spent 
In brutalizing wars, where hellish strife 
Could prompt each man to seek a brother's life." 

Prize Poem on the Life and Character of St. Paul. 

* Aforeover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called. — Ro- 
mans viii. 

Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy ; and whom 
be will, he hardeneth. — Romans ix. 

Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election 
hath obtained it. God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes 
that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, unto this 
day. — Komans xi. 

t Straight is the gate, and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life, 
and few there be that find it. 

t And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the 
left. Then shall he say unto them on the left hand, Depart from me 
ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. 
— Mat. XXV. 

(\ ' Else wherefore breathe I in a Christian land?' — Richard HI. 

11 A great part of the frothy epistles, or, as Cardinal Bembo very 
properly called them, Episiolaccia^ of this holy maniac, are filled with 
disgusting balderdash respecting the profitableness of circumcision ; 
wJiJsb, indeed, as the godly cock was a bit of a snipper himself, having 



87 

Of Old Nick's snmei'set, and sin original 

(The leading trumps with which the parsons pigeon all) : 

How to ' cast off the old man,' they'll explain ; 

And solve the slang of " being born again"—-' 

0( faith, foreknowledge, grace, and free-will bawl, 

Till it's as clear as mustard to us all. 

Whether the Yahoo's folly, or his pride, 
Most governs, 'tis not easy to decide ; 
But in the high-born race, 'tis plainly shown, 
Excess of pride* stamps them the devil's own ; 
Pride governs these through life, and strange to tell, 
Outweighs the terrors both of death and hell ! 

Two noble lords, sworn friends, sit down to play, 
(Both good church-going Christians in their way.) 
But if, as oft it happens, words arise, 
And one affirms what t'other lord denies ; 
Then anger's kindled, hateful passion grows, 
And Christian friends are chang'd to bitter foes. 
Urged by false honor, let who will be right, 
The challenged has no option but to fight ;f 

operated upon poor Tim, by depriving him of his foreskin, (Actsxvi.) 
is not so much to be wondered at. But why did not the saint esplaiu 
this holy business to his beloved sisters in the Lord, Priscilla, Mary, 
and the rest oF the chosen vessels, whom he desires may be saluted 
with a holy kiss ? — Romans xvi. 

+ " There is no danger so great, but by the help of his pride a man 
may slight and confront it; nor any manner of death so terrible, but 
with the same assistance he may court ; and if he has a firm constitu- 
tion, undergo it with alacrity." — Fable of the Bees. 

" La plus calamiteuse et fragile de toutes les creatures," says Mon- 
taign, "c'est Thomme, et quant et quant la plus orgueilleuse. — II me 
semble a la verite, que Nature, pour la consolation de notre estat mis- 
erable et chetiff, ue nous ait donns en partage que la presumption." 
— Essais, liv. 2, chap. 12. 

t " How comes it that a man of honor should so readily accept of a 
challenge, when in the prime of life and in perfect health ? It is his 
pride that conquers his fear: for when his pride is not concerned, this 
fear will appear most glaringly. If he is not used to the sea, let hitn 
but be in a storm ; or, if he never was ill before, have but a slight fe- 
ver, and he'll show a thousand anxieties, and in them the inestimable 
value he sets on life." — Search into Society, 383. 

" Un homme reli^ieux n'est-il pas bien sur de sa damnation eter- 



88 

And some so skilfully tbe weapons handle^ 

At twenty paces they can snuff a candle. 

So trained to murder in a genteel way, 

You may have satisfaction any day ; 

Giving the injured party who complains, 

Redress, by coolly blowing out his brains. 

Now where's their Christian love ? does worldly pride 

Set holy gospel precepts all aside ? , 

While thus to blind revenge, and murder giv'n. 

Are they e're checked by thoughts of hell or heaven 1 

Do these ' Corinthians ' in such affairs, 

Before they shoot each other, say their pray'rs ? 

Oh, no ! they laugh at all the parson's stuff-- 

They're high horn Yahoos, and quite ' up to snuff.'* 

YeSy vice and folly tinge the heart and brain, 
And leave behind an everlasting stain. 
Adam, we're told, sought wisdom, and was blam'd ; f 
He ate the apple, and his race was damn'd ;J 
If he was not permiited to be wise. 
Surely his offspring wisdom may despise. 

nelle s'il est tue en duel ? Et cependant I'honneur reiiiporte, et il se 
hdiiV'—M.deRimrol. 

* As such high-born prigs are always Cas well as the low born) well 
fitufFed with gospel mammon at their schools and colleges, how cornea 
ii they can so easily shake it all off, and send one another to hell so 
deliberately ? They should at least take a parson with them upon 
such occasions, to intercede with the Lamb in behalf of their precious 
souls, which are thus precipitated iato the fiery kke in scseula saculo- 
rum. 

t " Le soing de s'augument&r eh sagesse et en science, ce fut la 
premiere ruine du genre humain : c'est la voye par ou il s'est preci-. 
pite a la damnation eternelle/' — Montaigne. 

t Of all the absurdities that ever were foisted upon the imagination 
of a Yahoo, this apple story is the most completely ridiculous ! Ada»n 
should undoubtedly have been taught to seek knowledge, nor shun 
it, that thereby he might have avoided evil. If his instructor had been 
an evil genius, the interdiction would have been in character, as igno- 
rance is the parent of crime and misery. "Quand on fait reflection," 
says Voltaire, "que presque toule la terre a ^te infatuee de pariels 
contes, et qu'ils ont fait I'education du genre humain, on trouve lea 
fables de Pilpay et d'Esope bien ra.spnn.abl^s," 



S9 



We ought, 'tis plain, from siicli good scripture rules, 
To bring up all our children arrant fools.* 
And this has been the case since Adam's time ; 
To doubt, or speak the truth, is deem'd a crime. 
'Tis true, we've scores of metaphysic fools, 
From Brazen-nose and Corpus-Christi schools :t 
AH filled with learned ignorance and pride, | 
A. B.'s, L. D.'s, and Lord knows what beside ; 
Who with big wigs their owlish phizzes cook so, 
That if they are not wise, they try to look so. ^ 
They jabber about foAth^ by which is meant 
That you should give them credit for their cant ; 
For faith's not worth a fig which can't dispense, 
With things that give the lie to common sense. 
'Tis against reason, is it? that's enough ; 
A parson's creed demands no better proof. 
Faith's the grand nostrum for the parson's job's 
x'Ynd moves all ' stumbling-blocks' from Yahoos nobs. 
Weil stuff 'd with faith, and larded with devotion, 
You in a walnut-shell may cross the ocean : 
If ye doubt not, cry geehup when you will. 
And Highgate hops to Harrow on the Hill.|j 



**For in much wisdom is mnch grief: and he that increaseth 
knowledge increaseth sorrow." — Eccles. i. 18. 

t Brazen-faced would have been a more suitable appelation. What 
names for colleges of instruction ! Body of Christ ! This wretched 
kind of superstitious mummery is. carried to such an extent in the 
Catholic countries, that their inns and fighting ships are sanctified with 
the precious epithets of 'Blood of Christ/ 'Holy Ghost,' and ' Savior 
of the World,' &c. 

t "It may sound oddly," says Lord Bolingbroke, "but it is true in 
many cases to say, tliat if men had learned less, their way to knovv- 
Jedge would be shorter and easier. There is no cure for one who is 
taught to be a blockhead ; his ignorance is the fruit of instruction ; he 
has clogged his mind with learned darkness, and verifies the proverb, 
that meriis scholaticus est mencs asinus. — See Independent Whig, vol. i. 
pp. 2 and 258. 

^ " Thus pedants will hang out a solemn face, 

To put off nonsense with a better grace." — Young. 

*^ ' Jesus said, 'If ye have faith and doubt not, ye shall say unto this 
mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, and it shall 
be done." See Questions, viii. 119. — Mark xi. 

8h 



90 

The little hills by Faith will skip like lambs, 

And all the mountains dance like rams ;t 

To those with Faith all contradiction bends, 

A walking-stick may be without two ends. 

Charcoal milk-white, and snow as black as jet ; 

A brewer's horse may in a bottle get ; 

A man may jump down his own throat, and then 

(If it so please the Lord) jump up again. 

Faith at impossibilities ne'er wrangles, 

But sees distinctly round and square triangles ! 

Faith's the fa tutto, priestcraft corner stone ; 

Take that away, and presto ! all is gone.J 

Call it Credulity, the tribe roar out,* 

All in full chorus, ' They are damn'd who doubt.'f 

That doubt is nothing but the devil's snare, 

And sceptics all in hell, with old Voltaire ; 



* " Why bop ye so, ye high hills?" — Psalm Ixviii. '' The mountains 
skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs." — Psalm Ixviii. This 
silly bombast is called sublime ; so that there does not seem a straw to 
choose between nonsense and sublimity. Homer abounds in trash of 
this sort (one of the reasons why he is so much admired); where not 
only horses are weeping and discoursing, but even rivers get up and 
come to the ' scratch,' one f Xanthus) calling the other (Simois) to his 
assistance. Nonsense seems to amalgamate with the putty-like stuff 
in the skulls of the lords of reason, who are sure to delight in any 
thing in proportion to its absurdity ; their precious faith enabling them 
by obnmbrating and offuscating ("as Pomposo phrases it) their intel- 
lects, to see apple dumplings when there is only horse dung before 
their snouts ! Wonderful Yahoo ! thy gulibility exceeds aU power of 
imagiuatiou, 

t " La vertu fondemenfale de tonte religion, i. e. la plus utile a ses. 
niinistics c'est la foi. Elle consiste dans une crednlite sans homes, 
qui fait croire sans examen tout ce que les interpretes de la divinite 
out interet que Ton croie. La foi implicite a ele la source des plus 
grands attentats qui se soientcommis sur la terre." — Le Bon Sens. 

t " Credulity, cdU'd Faith, entraps the soul ;. 
She lies in wait for i.Jiotism and youth ? 
List'neth to tales baptized rigmarole. 

And makes them pass for oracles of truth." — Pindar. 

§' Doubt,' says Bolingbroke, 'is the key of knowledge: who da 
not don!)t will never examine ; and those who never examine will 
i:iever know, but remain in perpetual ignorance. — Philosophical Es- 

says. 



91 

Lament there's not a holy inquisition, 

To burn blasphemers in this wicked nation. * 

Such are our teachers, rev'rend sapient prigs ; 
Starch'd, formal things, in loop'd hats, bands and wigs 
Such are the Mentors of our public schools ; 
Is it a wonder Yahoos are such fools ? 
They'll tell you 'twas from pride that Satan fell, 
And that the rich with Dives are in hell. 
Style themselves plenipos from great Jehovah, 
And while they fleece their dupes, all live in clover. f 

Surrounded by his moon-eyed gaping rabble, 
Who prick their asses' ears up at his gabble, 
See Rowland Hill squint upwards to the sky, 
Like Macbeth at his dagger, and then cry, 
" Dearly beloved, mark well what I say, 
Cast off the old man ; ye must fast and pray :. 



* " But saints now persecute — those who wonl tuni 

To their idolatry, they hang and burn. 
They were not so at first — they could not be ; 

They wanted power ;. this obtained, we find 
Their character appear'd : from fear once free, 

The damning course began, which sunk mankind 
Beneath — aye, speak .'" to hide this truth were vain — 
Beneath the lowest brute that stalks the plain. 
Call'd civilized ! far better had ye been 

Like beasts that perish ; then ye would have liv'd 
And rov'd in harmony through wood and glen ; 

Nor would ye for the future then have griev'd : 
Or had ye fought it would have been for food. 
X Aud not for creeds ye never understood." — Prize Poem. 

t We need not wonder at the audacity of this tribe of black locusts, 
when we consider that " kings and queens" are to be their" nursing 
lathers and mothers, and are to bow their faces to the earth, and lick 
the dust off their feet " No wonder the Holy Bible is so industriously 
crammed into the maws of the besotted Yahoos, and so much holy zeal 
displayed in converting the heathen ! But if kings and queens are to 
"lick the dust ofFiheir feet," how are the swinish multitude to show 
f/teir respect to the Lord's ambassadors? Why, by licking someicAcrc 
else to be sure. II n'y a pas d'autre moyen ; and so they ought, in 
order to keep them in proper subjection. — Laud exhibited himself in 
his true colors when in the height of his career : he insolently said, he 
hoped 10 see the time when the greatest jack-gentlema» in the land 
should not dare to stand with his hat on before the meanest priest. 



92 

Ye're born in sin, and very prone to evil, • 

And but for me, ye'd soon be with the devil ; 

But heed him not, for ail his rant and racket, 

The Lord's appointed me to dust his jacket. 

Bring but your filthy lucre to the church, 

And we'll soon leave the rascal in the lurch : 

Renounce the world, and all its empty trash ; 

Good pious Christians never can want cash ! 

The Scripture moveth us in sundry places, 

To give the parson all, without wry faces ;* 

The holy gospel proves it's not a fib, 

'Twas so with iVnnanias and his rib ; 

They wanted for themselves to keep a penny, 

The Holy Ghost said, ' No ! ye sha'nt have any.' 

So down they tumbled like two cheating wretches, 

(Those who defraud the church, the devil fetches.) 

Don't think I tip ye holy gospel gammon, 

In order to cajole ye of your mammon : 

I scorn to meddle with your worldly pelf, 

I never want a farthing for myself. 

Poor souls, indeed, in this world I know many, 

Who smell meat m cook's shops, but ne'er taste any. 



* " Godliness is great gains. ' Bring me all thou hast and follow me 
is the true church maxiu)," says Gordon. " As many as were possess- 
ed of houses or lands sold them, and brought the prices of the things 
that were sold, and laid them down at the apostle's feet!" 

This is in the true spirit of holy rehgion ! Bring all, you cannot 
bring too much, as was barefiicedly avowed by John Wesley. * You,' 
says the pious holder forth, ' who have £200 a year, and spend but 
one, do you aive God the other hundred ? If not, you rob him of just 
so much. Oh, leave nothing behind you ! send ail you have before 
you go into a better world ! Lend it! lend it all unto the Lord, and 
it shall be paid you agiin. Haste, haste, my l)eloved ; haste lest you 
should be called away before you have settled what you have on this 
security. When this is done, you may boldly .say, Now I have nothing 
to do but to die! (true enough, John) Father, into thy hands I commit 
my spirit! come. Lord Jesus, come quickly.' — Southeys Life of IVesIey . 

We may well say with Cowper — 

" Legates and delegates with pow'rs from hell, 
Tho' heavenly in pretension, fleece us well.'' 

Or with Dodsly — 

" The noly drones monopolize the sky, 
And plunder by a vow of poverty." 



93 

Do, my beloved, pity their hard fale. 
And drop for tliem your money in the plate.* 
Remember you've your blessed Saviour's word, 
Give to the poor you lend unto the Lord." 

Oh, pious preachers, reverendissimos, ") 

Do give the rabble some religious shows, > 

And, pope like, let them kiss your holy toes. J 
How very much ye all by your behaviour. 
Observe the precepts of your ' blessed Saviour.' 
What self-denial ! modest, mild, and meek ; 
Ye never riches, or Commendams seek ; 
Ye never wish to swell your worldly store, 
But give whate'er ye get to feed the poor ; 
And call in all the crippled and the blind, 
Whene'er ye guttle, as ye are enjoin'd.f 
Ye've no vile appetites to gratify ; 
Temptations of the devil ye defy. 
All worldly vanities ye shun with care, 
Brown bread and gospel-sauce is precious fare ; 
Ye never stuff your guts at tavern dinners, 
" Christ and a Crust" is quite enough for sinners ; J 
Ye never swill, nor gormandize like be-asts. 
As greasy cits do, at their Lord May'r's feasts. 
If ye have double-chins and swagging paunches. 
It's not with cfilapash, nor luscious haunches j 
Ye poke no spoon in any rich man's dishes. 
Nor play the sycophant for loaves and fi§hes i 



* "Tis the saints godly maxim to beg for the pelf, 
In behalf of the poor, and then keep it himselt." 

t " When thou makeat a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor 
thy rich neighbors; call the maimed, the poor, the laibe and the blind.' 
— Luke xiv. Aye, catch'em at it ! a pretty rig, to see all the beggars 
in Lambeth sitting nose to nose with his grace of Canterbury, for- 
sooth ! 

t Many of the niawvvorm tribe ha^^ these cant phrases in their 
mouths, and boast of the riches of " Christ and a Crust," which they 
possess, and which their fleecing parsons tell them is quite sufficient, 
and all a good Christian needs. Bedlam is half-filled with these, poor 
creatures ; and the number of oztf-patients in'ected with the same rtVws 
(which Voltaire &jj)il^ de nam.ir\ates7a rero/c moxalc) is incrediljl^, 



94 

But mortify your flesh by pray'r and fasting, 
In order to obtain life everlasting. 

Such are our teachers and our preachers too ! 
All men of gumption — give the dev'l his due ;* 
With Bible blunderbuss, and Pray'r-book sabre, 
Poor Beelzebub's black hide they all be-labor ; 
While he, who knows that this is humbug stuff, 
Snaps his black fingers at their bounce and huff; 
For that, however, they pretend to scout him, 
They couldn't carry on their trade without him : ^ 
"So to his valet Smut (whi) combs his wigs 
And shaves him) says, " Go, teil the pulpit prigs 
I value not their gospel-raag a louse. 
But take their sermons to the little house ; 
To buffet me they only lose their pains, 
And show they're better stock'd with guts than brains 
But if they are for coming to the Scratch, 
By God Pll curry the whole blackguard batch."! 

Who, my lord bishop can with pride reproach, 
Allho' he lives in state, and keeps his coach ? 
Does he not with a pious phiz declare, 
That filthy lucre's riothing but a snare | 



" " Men that can strut it and look big, 

With store of guts as well as wig." — Homer. 

+ As these reverend devil-boxers are dressed in black, and are guards 
to the church, the Black Prince's epithet, if not very polite, is at least 
very appropriate. 

" Sure 'tis an orthodox opinion, 
/ That grace is founded in dominion. 
Great piety consists in pride ; 
To rule is to be sanctified ; 
To domineer and to control 
Both o'er the body and the soul, 
- , Is the most perfect discipline 

C Of church rule, and by right divine. 

For saints may do the same thing by 
The spirit, in sincerity, 
^Which other men are tempted to, 
\ • And at the devil's instance do; 
And yet the actions be contrary, 
Just as the saints and wicked vary." — Hudihras. 



95 



'. Nolo episcoparii" is his boast ; 

But then he's called on by the Holy Ghost ;* 

And when a ghost calls with such special news, 

How can a bishop in his heart refuse ^ 

Renouncing vanities and sinful lust, 

His treasure's where there's neither moth nor rust 

He scorns all mammon (just as dogs do mutton) ; 

But seeks it with the stomach of a glutton. 

He never makes provision for the morrow, 

But gives away his all, the Lord to follow ; 

In mein so lowly, and so truly meek. 

When struck on one he turns the other cheek ; 

Each angry and revengeful feeling smothers, 

INor e'er resents the trespasses of others. f 

But watch this canting tribe, and, if you've eyes, 

You'll find all this mere fudge and humbug lies — 

Mark well the conduct of these titbe-collectors. 

From high to low, arch-bishops, deans and rectors 



"* What a stock of brass must these reverends be endowed v/iih, to 
pronounce in the most solemn manner, and in the face of day, that 
ihey are unwilling to become bishops ; when at the same time it is well 
known that they have been exerlin,^ themselves in every way possible 
to obtain the mitre ! Shame, where is thy blush ? Talk of the impu- 
dence of a highwayman's horse ! bah ; transfer the comparison to a 
parson. 

t Only now and then, when the devil gets the ascendancy over these 
Lord's ambassadors, as happened lately ntar Twickenhan), where the 

Rev. prosecuted his gardener for stealing two penny worth of 

beef, of which he was convicted ; the parson having found the slice of 
meat in his possession, and carefully fitted it to the round from which 
it had been cut. But instances of clerical charity, forgiveness of tres- 
passes, and compassionate feeling for the poor, abound. A icortky 
rector (of Blue-coat schnol notoriety), within one hundred miles vi' 
Edmonton, who has only about £2000 per annum, threatened his gar- 
dener with legal punishment for making free with a few potatoes not 
long since ! While another worthy of the sable corps, not far from 
Leatherhead, and who is moreover a just-ass, fined a poor laboring 
man nine shillings for selling a few cherries, which grew in his own 
garden, on the Lord's day. What a blessing the LorcVs day is to the 
poor — in spirit! No wonder the swinish multitude are all so eager 
to Kalute the posteriors of their spiritual pastors, before they can even 
slip down their unmentionables. 



96 

You'll soon perceive the glaring contradiction, 

And that their ghostly jabber's all a fiction. 

Of such you'll always find the tongue and heart, 

Like east and west, lie very far apart.* 

And verifies what, Hobbes said long ago, 

That words would with a fool for money go : 

But with the wise would not so easy pass. 

They smelt the diff'rence soon 'twixt gold and brass. f 

The Yahoo, as if prompted by the devil, 
To physical has added moral evil ; 
His self-tormenting mind is on the stretch 
To plague himself, and be his own Jack Ketch. 
What he thinks wrong to-day, to-morrow's right j 
He loves at noon what he detests at night : 
The fiend that plagues him, his own sickly brain. 
Turns all his schemes of pleasure into pain. 
A slave to all the follies of the great, 
Whate'er they do he's sure to imitate. 
Tell him., 'mongst lords and dukes it is the mode, 
He'll walk upon his head, or eat a toad.^ 
Should any blockhead cut his coat in half, 
AVhen he walk'd out the rabble all would laugh, 
But tell them 'tis a lord, the ape-like crew, 
To look like him, cut all their coats in two.§ 
Fashion's the magic word ; if some grand fool 
Is all be-whisker'd, it becomes the rule : 
The Yahoos all then try to gain applause, 
By looking like baboons about the jaws. || 

* " Is there a churchman who on God relies, xT . 
Whose life his faith and doctrine justifies ? ^^. 

Not one." Lord Rochester. 

t It was an observation of Hobbes, that words *' were the counters 
of wise men, and the money of fools." 
X Dodsley's Poems. 

§ It is said, Lord Spencer, for a wager, to prove the folly of the 
Yahoo, as to fashion, in imitating the upper orders, actually appeared 
in public places in half a coat, i. e. with the skirts cut off; and, in a 
very short time, every body followed the example, and appeared in a 
eimilar dress; which was from that circumstance dubbed a Spencer, 

II Whiskers are manufactured at present, and dyed to any color for 
Buch as may want them in haste, when they are stuck on ! Vast im- 
provements. 



97 

Ask one of these brute -snouted prigs, what news ? 

He'll tell you Hoby makes the smartest shoes : 

Or should you want an exquisite cut coat, 

Stultz is your man, when tipp'd a ten-pound note. 

See dear Miss Tommy dressing ! — what's he at ? H 

Why, studying how to tie on his cravat : 

Of modes there are no less than thirty-six,* 

And Tommy doesn't know on which to fix ! 

What • march of mind !' what scientific days ! 

Women wear boots, and long-back'd lubbers stays. 

Folly, thy name is Yahoo — thou dost show 
Thyself conspicuous both in belief and beau. 
The females, with their form dissatisfied. 
And half-deranged through pieiy and pride,) 
By pads, cork-rumps, and lacing-tight, pretend 
The shape that nature gave them they can mend ; 
And who'll dispute the female Yahoo's taste, 
Who barters health to gain a slender waist ! 
Screw'd in so tight they scarce can draw their breath. 
Persisting, even though it threatens death. 
All tops and bottoms, nothing now' will do. 
Unless, like wasps, they're nearly cut in two. 
In shape an hour-glass, pinch'd up in the middle, 
And puft''d out round the shoulders and bum-fiddle! 
As if for Venus-Hottentots design'd, 
They hang a full-stnff"'d pocket on behind. 
Each to be foremost in the folly brags. 
Huge bushel bonnets — sleeves like pudding-bags ! 
"Gigot de mouton" call'd, of Paris fame, 
Though *' jambe de bceuf " would be a fitter name. 

* A book is advertised, called the " Art of tyina^ on a Cravat," price 
33. in which there are thirfy-!W) modes! exhibited on plates, with a 
" History of the Cravat from Us Ori«iiri to the present Time," &c. : 
with a portrait of the author ! which has run through three editions. 
Oh, intellect, no wonder there is so much boasting of thy spread. 

t" Fiailty, thy name is woman,'' says the divine bard ; bnt why not 
man? The females do certainly crowd most into the Gospel-shops; 
many, no doubt, from the fear of the devil, and many from vanity to 
display their finery ; but are the puppies of the masculine gender 
much behind them in absurdity 7 

9 



If JFrench, howe'er preposterous or frightful, 
The Yahoo belles all cry, " Oh, how delightful 1" 

Observe those coxcombs all so slowly pacing, 
To show off — 'tis the funeral of a Mason. 
With leather aprons, compasses, and rules, 
By which to prove that they're no common fools ; 
With antics that would make the devil grin. 
They're at an ale-house what is call'd * tiled-in.^ 
Building a temple then to work they go, 
To imitate king Solomon's in show. 
The great Jew king was pleas'd with apes we find,* 
And these are their descendants left behind : 
Some say they're with hot pokers mark'd — why not ? 
When we behold the Yahoo such a sot.f 

Absorb'd in follies, but yet never sated, 
The Yahoo's first with this, then that elated. 
One childish fancy after t'other's tried, 
Be-pictur'd now, and now be-butterfly'd ; 
Be-shell'd, be-fiddled, magnetizing next ; 
Seeking amusement still, and still perplex'd. 



* ' Every three years once came the ships of Tarshish, bringing gold 
and silver, and apes, and peacocks.'— 2 Chron. ix. 

H these wiseacres were to exhibit a model of the royal Jews' serag- 
lio it would be highly amusing, with the apartments for his thousand 
belles ! 

" Where Solomon in wisdom shines, 

Among his wives and concubines: 

A thousand only ? what a quantum ! 

To play with him at rantum skanttjm ! 
■^ Sure wenches then were ten a-penny, 

When this Jew king could get so many. 

One should have guess'd, as gold was plenty, 

He might have had eighteen or twenty, 

But such aposse ! zounds and blood ! 

Enough to drive him mad, by God. 

Smouch might be rich, perhaps; hutwise! 

Oh, no ! the ghost may tell us lies — 

Peacocks and apes he might possess: 

But sure of wisdom no man less." 

t " Oh ! we are ridiculous animals ! and if angels have any fan in 
(hem, hx>w we must divert them." — Horace Walpole. 



99 

Through F. S. A.'s old lumber then he blunders, 

Like Katerfelto's cat,* announcing " wonders '/* 

Buys an old p — pot fashion'd " a la Grecque,'^ 

From Herculaneum dug, a true antique ! 

Then purchases a cockle-shell, a ballad,! 

Or tries to prove fleas lobsters,^ duckweed salad ! 

At night he joins the superfine-ear'd crowd, 

To hear " The Calalani" scream aloud. 

Next morning hurries oft' with great delight 

To see two blackguards, Crib and Belcher, fight : 

One day he runs to see a Lord Mayor's show, ' 

The next with dogs and horses — tally-ho \\ 

A noble lord now mounts the coachman^s box, 

" Hayt, hayt !" he cries, and on the foot-board knocks : 

A Belcher round his neck, a kiddy smile, 

Ten capes, topp'd boots, squirts thro' his teeth in style 

Handles the ribands in a natty way ; 

Proud the stage-coachman's science to display: 

Upon the road picks all common slang up, 

Which he retails among his " Club of Bang-up." 

A jockey, groom-taught, knowing set of lords, 

To whom slage-fighting, nohle sport affords ; 

An M^jier order, high bred, titled race. 

Who think such blackguardism no disgrace. 



* A quack, or conjuror, who exhibited his tricks some years ago in 
Piccadilly, and boasted the wonderful sagacity of a very large black 
cat in his possession. His placards were always headed Wonders. 

t The mania for rubbish of this sort has been carried to such a pitch 
that five pounds have been given at a sale for an old play bill ; anti- 
quity adding such value to useless things! One of these Dilletantis, 
it is said, has expended considerable sums in the purchase of a regular 
series of turnpike tickets ; and another in collecting old ballads, which 
he has had pasted down in alphabetical and chronological order. 

X "Fleas are not lobsters, damn their souls." See Pindar's account 
of Sir Joseph Banks' endeavor to ascertain this important matter. 

$ " Our manner of hunting," says Chesterfield, '' is only suitable to 
boobies and bumpkins; the poor beasts are pursued, and run down 
by much greater beasts than themselves. The true British foxhunter 
is, most undoubtedly, a species appropriated and peculiar to this coun- 
try, which no other part of the globe produces." 



100 

» 

A bull-bait next delights,* or Cock-lane gbost,t 

The last found folly always pleasing most.J 

A monkey-mermaid now he runs to view ! ^ 

A "living skeleton's" the next thing new. 

Now brother Block comes in with news ! Eh, what? 

Why, there's a charming Venus-Hottentot ! 

Pleas'd he starts off, and stares with vacant face, 

Then hurries down to join Newmarket Race. 

With black-legs there of sweepstakes he converses. 

And bets, to show his knowledge of race-horses. 

" I'll take your bet, my lord, of three to one ; 

I lay on Slammerkin :" 'tis done and done. 

Dup'd of his money home he steers again. 

And to the cockpit hastes to see the main.\\ 

* The amusements of the Yahoo a century back ("before the intellect 
began marching^, correspond very much with the lion, dog, and stago 
fighting of the present 'enlightened' time. A placard in the time of 
Brandy Nan. announcing bull and bear baiting at Hockley in the Hole, 
concludes in the following words: " And a great mad bull will be 
turned loose in the yard with fire-works all over him, and two or three 
cats tied to his tail. — Regina vivat " 

t The poor soft cockneys, as well as the higher orders, were dread- 
fully terrified with this hobgoblin for several weeks. The consterna- 
tion became general ; and the great pomposo, who was an advocate 
for every kind of superstitious mummery, gave it full credence. It 
was also countenanced (no wonder) by all the reverends, and many of 
the nobility. See Walpole's Correspondence, vol. ii. 333. 
X " Enchanting novelty, that moon at full, 
That finds out every crevice of the head, 
That is not sound and perfect, haih in theirs 
Wrought this disturbance. — Cowper. 

^ This humbug served the cockney Yahoos for pro and con. several 
months, and even occasioned a law-suit, being chrnued by two owners. 
It was subsequently discovered to be a composition. A stuffed moa> 
key's skin, to which was attached the tail of a dried fish. 

II This infernal blood hound sport is encouraged by Yahoos calling 
themselves ^ew</ewe« CCorinthian capitals of polished society). The 
following advertisement was inserted in the Morning Post not long 
since: — " Cocking — To be fought at the Royal Cockpit, on Monday 
next, and all the week, a great subscription match ; begins fighting at 
half-past 6. Dinner on table at 4. On Priday tnorning in the same 
week, will be fought a Welsh main* for j£5()." Oh, heaven-born Ya- 
hoo ! Christian and church-goer, no wonder you are compared to 
angels in your actions t 

* This consists in setting? 20 or 30 of these poor birds to engage together«i 
{trmeci with steel spurs— what a piciure of hell and demuns. 



101 

Next night to Drury Lane perhaps he flies, 

And praises Master Betty to the skies : 

" Oh, what a genius !" He*s in rapture lost ! 

To-morrow he's a dolt — a p g post.* 

But most of all, the Yahoo's chief delight 

Is guzzle, whether morning, noon, or night. 

That seems their " summum bonum," old or young ; 

And is their morning, noon, and evening song. 

To that they fly, to save them from dull thinking. 

And such their weakness, that they'^re proud of drinking.f 

For tho' their reason is so much their boast. 

Their happiest time is when their reason's lost. 

This precious gift the better to display, 

They turn the day to night, the night to day. 

Witness their midnight Bacchanalian shouts. 

And vile, disgusting, swinish, drunken bouts ! 

Like polecats, stinking with tobacco smoke ; 

With guzzle drench'd, then comes the song and joke. 

Then comes the ' tol de rol,' and ' hey down derry/ 

With ' push about the glass, and let's be merry.' 

* The " spread of intellect' was never more conspicuous than at this 
period. Master Betty's celebrity was wonderful, and the desire to see 
him perform on the stage so great, that not a place could be secured 
for the fij;st six nights. The whole town flocked to the theatre to seo 
a parrot-taught boy make love to a woman three or four times his age, 
big enough to devour him, and who. was looking down at him like the 
eow to Tommy Thumb. The young Roscius, as he was called, was 
paid for this mummery £50 per night ! John Kemble, we are told, 
was engaged at near £40 per week at the same time. A pretty mode- 
rate sum ibjr ranting and bellowing out a few fustian tragedy sentences, 
larded with ah's and oh's about kings and queens, and such hke china- 
ware. — See Reynold's Memoirs. 

t " The principle of vanity," says Chesterfield, " is so strong in hu- 
man nature, that it descends even to the lowest objects. A man will 
boast, perhaps swear, that he has drank six or eight bottles of wine at 
a sitting : out of charity I will believe him a liar, for if I do not I must 
think him a beast But there are thousands of popular ballads encou- 
raging this depravity; such as "I guzzle each night till I'm carried up 
stairs"-—" He that goes to bed sober," &c. ; or, as Colman observes — 
*' That there are swilling wights in London town, 
Term'd jolly dogs — choice spirits, Calias swine, ^ 
Who pour, in midnight revels, bumpers down. 
Making their throats a thoroughfare for wine." 

Broad Grin». 
. 9l 



102 

You'll see a score of " reason's lords" together, 
Smoking the " devil's weed"* in sultry weather ! 
Stark blind to Chesterfield, and all his graces,t 
They puff out clouds in one another's faces : 
Each adding to the vile, infernal smother, 
As if they meant to stifle one another! 
If sulphur was but added to the smell, 
It justly might be call'd a little hell.| 
Oh, Jammie, Jammie ! what would'st thou have said, 
If thou had'st seen a hell like this display'd ? 
Thy hair, no doubt, would at the horrid sight, 
Have push'd thy cap off, and stood bolt upright ! 
Tho' for a Solomon thou once didst pass, 
Thy proper title should be Royal Ass. 
To write and rail against the devil's weed, 
Proves thee an ass in grain, of long-ear'd breed. 



* So called by King James, the first crowned lubber who was dub- 
bed 'sacred.' 

t " Remember the graces, for without them " ogni fatica e vana." — 
Adieu : " Les graces, les graces." — Chesterfield's Letters. 

X " Surely smoke becomes a Kitchen much better than a dining- 
chamber, and yet it makes a kitchen oftentimes in the inward parts of 
men, soiling and infecting them with a unctuous and oily kind of soot, 
as hath been found in some great tobacco-smokers, that after their 
death were opened." — K. James Counterblast to Tobacco. 

" What a vast traffic is drove, what a variety of labor is performed 
in the world, to the maintenance of thousands of families, that altoge- 
ther depend on two silly, if not odious customs — the taking of snufF, 
and su)oking of tobacco; both of which, it is certain, do infinitely 
more harm than good to those who are addicted to them. — JSandc- 
vine's Search into Society. 

Pass where We may, thro' city or thro' town, 
Village or hamlet of this merry land, 
Tho' lean and beggar'd, ievery twentieth pace 
Conducts th' unguarded nose to such a whiff 
Of stale debauch, forth issuing from the styes 
That law has licens'd, as makes temp'rance reel. 
There sit involv'd, and lost in curling clouds 
Of Indian fume, and guzzling deep, the boor, 
The lackey and the groom ; the craftsman there 
Takes a Lethean leave of all his toil i 
Smidi. cobbler, joiner, he that plies the shears, 
And he that kneads the dough; all loud alike, 
All learned, and all drunk. ' — Cowptr. 



103 

Couldst thee not guess that when thy subjects smoked. 
Unless supplied with swill, they'd soon be choked ? 
And that a petty tax upon malt liquor, 
Would bring some millions into thy exchequer !• 
And millions, all must own, are charming things, 
To swell the pockets of poor needy kings. 

Nor should the Yahoo's gambling be forgot, 
The sure resource of every knave and sot. 
Thousands of males and females spend the night, 
In shuffling packs of cards — their dear delight ! 
All sorts, all classes, are engaged in play 
And so deprav'd, they shun the light of day. 
'Tis now a master vice, and thrives so well, 
That every house is, more or less, a " hell." 
Not for low gaming, they scorn petit jeu^ 
'Tmust be piquant^ or else it will not do. 
Hence Crockford's dashing palaces arise. 
To lure rich fools, and dazzle greenhorn's eyes ; 
"Where gudgeons are urged on to make a dash, 
By sharks who diddle 'em and get their cash. 

Yes, these are " reason's lords," the strutting race, 
Who boast their form divine, and heav'nly grace ! 
Their faculties perverted, prove their curse,t 
And what was bad before, they make still worse. 



* The sums produced to the revenue by taxes upon the swill of the 
Yahoo surpasses belief: with the additional one of tobacco, which 
appertains as a stimulus to drunkenness, the amount is from ten to 
twelve njillions per annum ! No wonder so many sot's holes are seen 
in every direction. 

" The excise is fattened with the rich result 

Of all this riot, and ten thousand casks 

For ever dribbling out their base contents, 

Touch'd by the iVlidas finger of the state, 

Bleed gold for ministers to sport away." — Cotcper. 
t"But when a creature pretending to reason," my master said, 
"could be guilty of such enoru)ilies, he dreaded lest the corruption of 
that faculty might be worse than brutality itself. He seemed therefore 
confident, that instead of reason, we were only possessed of some 
quality fitted to increase our natural vices ; as the reflection from a 
troubled stream returns the image of an ill-shapen body, not only 
larger, but more distorted." — Swift. 



104 

To make their own affiiction more secure, 
Establish laws of primogeniture ; 
By which my lord brings up one cub in state, 
And leaves the rest to curse their ragged fate. 
Then, lest Old Nick, should envy their condition, 
Add to their other curses Superstition !* 
The first deprives them of their daily bread. 
The latter damns them after they are dead.f 
Not all the plagues Pandora's box let out, 
Which ever since to curse us, swarm about, 
Are half so bad as what these purblind elves. 
These " lords of reason," bring upon themselves. j: 

Some say the Fates, indeed, like ill-spun toads, 
Send us all plagues and troubles by cart-loads.^ 
That block or hammer we are doomed to be ; 
Thump or be thumped 's our wretched destiny : 



* " La superstition," says Helvetius, "estune source cmpoisounee, 
d'ou sont soriistous les malheurs, et les calamites de la terre. 

t The heavy curses of primogeniture and superitilion stick to the 
poor Yahoo hke a pitch plaster, and keeps his snout to the grindstone 
to the end of his existence. By the former he is kept, from the ex- 
treme inequality of property it occasions, in a state of servitude ap- 
proaching to slavery and starvation ; and by the latter (called religion) 
rendered an idiot, ted upon moonshine, and cajoled out of the good 
things in this world, upon an assurance of receiving a hundred fold in 
another, from a juggling tribe of impostors, who know no more of 
another world than the beagles they tally-ho with, or the fox they so 
heroically gallop after, and whose motto ought to be that on the sun- 
dial — " ignore quod doceo." The Yahoo, however, in return, is re- 
warded with the prosing of a "jack in a box" about the wonderful 
dispensations and goodness of Providence, and gratified with the 
trumpeters' gaudy laced jackets, with which he ought to be satisfied; 
and sav as he does over his mutton, " the Lord make us truly thank- 
ful." ' 

t " Moral evils are of our own making, and undoubtedly the greater 
part of them may be prevented." — Southey's Colloquies. 

"I am convinced," says Lord Byron, "that men do more harm to 
themselves, than ever the devil could do to them." 

" And feeble sufT'rers groan, 
With brain-born dreams of evil, all their own," 

$ " And whatsoever we perpetrate, 
We do but row, we're stecfd by Fate." — Mudihras. 



105 

Predestin'd all to good, or else to evil ; 
One to Jehovah, fifty to the devil. 

What, then, are Yahoos thus compell'd to be, 
The instruments of their own misery ?* 
Oh, no ! pride, envy, avarice and ambition, 
Have brought " God's image" to this sad condition. 
Greedy as death, the universal cry, 
Is gold ! more gold ! incessant till they die : 
And could they utter words when laid in dust, 
More gold ! their livid lips would utter first. 
Drain Mexico of gold, bring all Peru ; 
Insatiate still, they howl for Timbuctoo. 
Gold is the god the Yahoos all adore ! 
There's no one criminal unless he's poor. 
Should Christ himself but visit this proud town, 
And ride his ass in Broadway up and down, 
The present, though a Bible reading race. 
Would shun him, or else giggle in his face : f 
While one, perchance, among the puppy crowd, 
To gratify the rest, might bawl aloud, 
(When he had twigg'd him through his glass) 
" God damme, Jack, here's Sancho on his ass ! 
Zounds, what a quiz !" — The belles, too, in a fright, 
Would tumble into fits at such a sight. 
For pelf they scramble, gold's the grand pursuit, 
For gold they'll ransack earth, and hell to boot ;<^ 
Whatere's the pretext, that is still the aim ; 
The gen'ral cry is " chacun pour soi-meme." 



* " Why charge mankind on heaven their own offence, 
And call their woes the crimes of Providence ? 
Blind ; who themselves their miseries create, 
And perish by their folly not their ^fe." — Dodsley. 

t " They're now so proud, that should they meet 
The twelve apostles in the street, 
They'd turn their nose up at them all. 
And shove their Saviour from the wall."— CAwrcAi//. 

t " Hear London's voice — ' Get money, money still, 
And then let virtue follow if she will;' 
Still, still be getting, never, never rest." — Pope. 



> 106 

All pull and haul, and kick, and cuff, and grapple, 
The worst hog always getting the best apple. 

See Sir Janves Grub, absorb'd in deep-laid schemes, 
Gold haunts his thoughts all day, all night his dreams.. 
Possess'd of half a million, still he's poor, 
And saves a penny to increase his store ;* 
Give him the hide and tallow for his pains, 
He'll whip a louse a mile, and boast his gains. 
In thrifty maxims he displays his wit, 
" Get what you can, and hold fast what you get." 
He'll tell you with an oily canting tongue, 
" Man wants but little here, and that not long ;"t 
Tho', from his griping, it appears 
As if he thought to live a thousand years. 

Did Adam in his garden covet riches ? 
Why zounds ! he wasn't worth a pair of breeches !| 
There were no " ckapeaux-hras'*^ for Mister Adam> 
Nor fringe, nor furbelow, § to deck his madam ! 

* Sir James Lowther, after changing a piece of silver in St. George 
coffee house, and paying twopence for his dish of coffee, was helped 
into his chariot, (for he was then very lame and infirm) and proceeded 
home ; a short time after he returned to the house, on purpose to ac- 
quaint the woman who kept it that she had given him a bad halfpenny, 
and demanded another in exchange for it. Sir James had about forty 
thousand pounds per annum, and was at a loss whom to appoint his 
heir." — Dr. King^s Anecdotes. 

Montaigne observes, ' De vray ce n'est pas la disette, c'est plutot 
I'abondance qui produit I'avarice.' 

t The whine of every discontented growling Yahoo, although his 
factitious wants are gratified every hour in the day ; and who requires 
the two extremes of the globe to be ransacked before he can sit down 
to his breakfast. 

t Time was, when clothing^, sumptuous or for use, 
Save their own painted skins, our sires had none. 
As yet black breeches were not: satin smooth. 
Or velvet soft, or plush, with shaggy pile." — Coicper. 

^ According to the old catch, however, the lady was provided with 
this ornament — 
^^^pr- " Adam catch'd Eve by the fur-below; 

/"^ And that's the okiest catch I know." 

It does not seem probable, every thing considered, that Mister Adam 



107 

They never dreamed of concerts, balls, or ronts, 
But vvrapp'd their bottoms up in fig-leav'd clouts ;* 
Till great Jehovah made thenn skin surtouts,t 
That they might look more like their fellow brutes. 

But what's this scramble for ? what object's gain'd ? 
Is real happiness thereby altain'd ? 
A million may be gain'd by negro gangs, 
Who groan beneath church-going Christians'* fangs, 
Yet bring with it remorse, tho' juggling priests 
Say, negroes unbaptized are only beasts ; 
And pious rum-and-sugar dealing knaves, 
Prove from their Bible, " niggers" should be slaves ;J 
Since Moses says, that Noah (an old Jew) 
Got fuddled now and then (as Christians do), 



would have spun out his existence to a much longer period (only 930 
years) if the wicked one had not seduced his rib, nor he have munched 
the peepin, at least if we give credence to the Italian proverb — 

" Herba cruda, Donna ignuda, 

E dormir a piano terra, 

Manda I'uomo sotto terra." 
And what else could he boast of in his blessed state. 

* In an English Bible (1615) are the following words: "And they 
sewed up fig leaves together, and made themselves 6rcec/jes." Gene- 
sis iii. See Hudibras. 

t "Unto Adam and his wife, (did they jump over a broomstick) did 
the Lord make coats of skins, (what skins ?) and clothed them." — Ge- 
nesis iii Pretty devils, no doubt, they must have appeared in their 
bear skin wrap-rascals! How comes it this precious pair of originals 
are never represented in our paintings dressed in these eminently 
beautiful jackets, which they must have undoubtedly been, having been 
cut out by the great Jehovah himself, to whom the great Stuliz cannot 
be supposed worthy of holding a candle? And is it not greatly to be 
regretted that the patterns of such magnificent dresses have not been 
preserved (as the particulars and dimensions uf Noah's ark have,^ for 
the benefit of the fashionable puppies and their dolls; as they then 
might have swaggered and strutted " comme il faut," and rumped the 
rabble with a good grace. 

I " Mr. Canning one day quoted the Bible to sanction Christian 
slavery, and Mr. Wilberforce had but little to say in reply. And was 
Christ crucified that black men might be scourged ? If so, he had bet- 
ter been born a mulatto, to give both colors an equal chance of free- 
<Jom, or at least of salvation." — Byron. 



108 

And in that state was by his son discover'd, 

Laying pig fashion,* with his uncoverM ;t 

Who, grinning like an unlick'd cub, exclaim'd, 
*' Oh, fie, papa ! you ought to be asham'd ! 
You tipple, and get pogey with your wine. 
And then lie naked, sprawling like a swine." 
But Mister Ham's joke with his Pa — alas ! 
A black'ioke prov'd, for lo ! " it came to pass," 
That for his graceless prank his generation. 
By black skins should betray their degradation :| 
Since when, the woolly-headed, flat-nosed race, 
Have been with white-skinn'd Yahoos in disgrace ;§ 
Who, tho' they flog them, save their precious souls 
By baptism, or they'd go to hell in shoals. || 

But let's suppose that Rumpuncheon comes 
From negro-driving with a brace of ' plums ': 
The ill-got wealth but seldom brings content ; 
For ostentation it is chiefly meant. 
His pride, parade, and pomp, and puff" and swell, 
And vice and folly, how it's squander'd tell. 
Profusion comes with glitter, show, and glare, 
And color'd lamps, to make the rabble stare ; 



. ♦" The little pigs lay with their haire."— Old Ballad. 

t "And he ('Noah) drank of the wine and was drunken, and he was 
tincovered within his lent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the 
nakedness of his father." — Gen. ix. 

X " And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger 
son had done unto him." [What had he done ?] " And he said, curs- 
ed be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren." — 
Gen. ix. True Bible justice ! the father in fault, and the children all 
cursed for it. 

§ " He finds his fellow guilty of a skin 

Not colour'd like his own, and having pow'r 
T' enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause, 
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey." — Coicper. 

\\ " Happy, thrice happy now the savage race, 

Since Europe takes their gold and gives them grace /" 

CliurchiU. 



109 

While ev'ry thing that's dear or ugly's bought, 
And sphinxes, and sarcophaguses sought !* 
With costly toys the mansion soon abounds, 
The lady's necklace cost ten thousand pounds If 
Baubles of all sorts cram each vacant space, 
And dizen'd lacqueys all bedaubed with lace. 
Then a grand rout ! what exquisite delight 
To make a thund'ring through the Square all night ! 
Three or four hundred fools, or mad folks* rather, 
To sip slop tea and ices, squeeze together ; 
Who at the door make such a horrid din, 
As if all bedlam wanted to get in !| 



* " Mun's licli with liule were his judgment true, 

Nature is frugal, and her wants are few ; 

Those few wants answered, hring sincere delights; 

But fools create themselves new appetites: 

Fancy and pride seek things at vast expense, 

Which relish not to reason or to sense" — Young. 
"Hunger, thirst and nakedness, are the first tyrants that force us to 
stir; afterwards our pride and sloth, sensuality and fickleness, are the 
great patrons that promote all arts and sciences, trades and callings." 
— Mandeville's Search into Societjj. 

t Who could siqipose that such an enormous sum could ever be 
demanded for a string of hanbles, to hang round the neck of a female 
Yahoo 1 It is however certain that a necklace of that estimated value 
was purloined, a few years since, from the shop of Messrs. llundle 
& Bridge, and a great reward offered for the recovery. Yet £] 0,000 
at the present day seems nothing, since v%'iihin the last year or two wo 
have heard a trinket of the san)e sort, belonging to the Princess of 
Orange, was fdcJicd ('conveyed,' the wise call \i) at Brussels, worth 
onhj £80,000. Goramity has blest the Yahoo with tcisdom to so!))e 
purpose ! 

Voltaire supposes the two hundred snippings, called foreskins, 
which holy David, like a gallant suitor, brought King Saul, were strung 
on a pack thread, and intended for a necklace for the fair Miss M',- 
chal, his daughter. The Lord's annointed (her daddy) had indeed 
only demanded o.^e hundred as the price of t;ie lady; but Davy gene- 
rously brmgs double the number required, unwilling she should be 
deficient in such precious iiicknacks for the ornament of her person, 
or toilette. 

t It is a part of the etiquette of these moon stricken assemblages to 
mike as much noise as possible with the knocker at the street door, 
which is rattled with all the fury of a frenzied lunatic for about half a 
minute upoji the arrival of every carriage; aiid if three or four parties 
arrive at the same time, they are let in separately, the door shut, and 
the horrible thundering at the knocker repeated by each, by which the 

10 



no 

Now crowding, pushing, treading on a corn ; 

And shawls, and scarfs, and gauze, and muslin's torn ; 

While screw'd up dolls and dandies, daub'd with paint, 

ilave all their laces cut, or else they faint.* 

And then what pleasure next day to peruse, 

A pufi''d up, paid-for statement in the News ! 

" Lady Rumpuncheon's rout, and grand display f 

Of all the rank and fashion of the day, 

With all the delicacies of the season" 

(The puffer knows what sort of cant is pleasing. );{: 

Viola high life ! the ton, among the great ! 

The folks possessing ' plums,' who live in slate ! 

What " march of mind i" for an enlighten'd nation ! 

What cagmag stuif fia- " lords of the creation !"§ 



uproarious din is conlintjed for hoiira together, to the great delight 
ol" the neighbors, who are all tarred wiih the same stick, and highly 
amused uiih this "hell broke loose" racket. To heighten the absur- 
dity, the rout givers send iheir empty carriages round the next morn- 
ing, with a footman, and cards of compliments, and inquiry after the 
welfare of the parties who honored their '•little St. Luke's" the pre- 
ceding evening! Oh, what happiness to exist in such a truly enlight- 
ened age ! — See Don Juan, canto ix, stanza 67. 

* The lacing up these be-whiskered, cigar-smoking puppies, is a 
modern refinement in dress, supposed to contribute to the elegance of 
the Yahoo's shape (pretty dears!) and is an indubitable proof of the 
no much boasted march of intellect. Thats/te doJls, who are milliners, 
or priest-governed from the cradle to the coffin, should give way to 
such silliness is not to be wondered at — but for great long-legged, 
brawny-backed lubbers io affect such molly-coddle, contemptible efii- 
minacy, is uiosi disgraceful ! 

" Fops at all corners, lady like in mein, 

Civetied ptijipies, smelt ere they are seen." — Trocinium. 

t " This lady glories in profuse expense, 
And thinks distraction is magnificence." — Young. 

X See this conteujptible sort of puffing happily ridiculed in a bur- 
lesque expose of a Blowbladder street rout in Bulliana. 

^ " But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade, 
With all the freaks of wanton wealth array'd ; 
In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain, 
The toiling pleasure sickens into pain ; 
And ev'n while fashion's brightest arts decoy, 
The heart distrusting, asks if ihis be joy ?"— Goldsmith, 



Ill 

By loyally and higli-born blockheads bred,* 

(When a fish stinks, 'tis first about the head,) 

Descending then to cits and plebs it goes, 

And over all the tide of folly flows, f 

Reaching at last the " nuiltitude of swine," 

Who in their turn have routs ! and stink and shine. J 

Such is the blessed Christian Yalioo race, 
Who, whitewash'd in lamb's blood, abound in grace : 
Such is the saint-liko crew, who talk of heav'n, 
Tho' air infected with the devil's leaven. 
A gospel -poring, canting tribe, who boast 
Of fellowship (God bless us) with "a ghost li^ 
A sacramental, pure, craw-thumping herd, 
All saved by faith, thro' Jesus Christ their Lord: 
Who lie, and trick, and cozen all the week, | 
And on the Lord's day go the Lord to seek 



* See Don Juan, canto x, stanza 85. ' OIi, Mrs. Fry.' 

t " But lo ! the fatal victor of n)aiiUi{}d, 
SwoTti luxury 1 — pale ruin stalks behind !"' — Essay on Satins, 

t '' Increase of pow'r begets increase of wealth K 
' Wealth Inxiiry, and hixnry excess* \ 

.' Excess, the scrofulous and itchy plague, \. 

That seizes first the opulent, descends 

To the next rank contagious, and in time 

Taints downward all the graduated scale 

Of order from the chariot to the plough." — (^oicper. 

^ ' And the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be with you all evermore.' 
Liiiirgy. 

Ij " Two gods divide them all — pleasure and gain : 
For these they live. Lust in their hearts 
.And mischief in their hands, lliey roaui the earth 
To prey upon each other." — Coicper. 

It is not long since one of the petty African kings .«;aid, ' ho vvo\ikf 
PHud his son to En l: land, to learn to read book, and be great rogue." 
This negro had formed no incorrect opinion of the civilization which 
ho had see!), and of the education which is given in the school qftrada! 
— Southey's Collcquies. 

" Wiien yon have seen a little of the world," says Sir Walter ScotJ, 
"you will tSien be no stranger to the policy of life, which deals in 
mining and countermining." The real opinion the Yahoos entertain. 
of ono another is pretty evidently shown by their always reqniriiii; 
stamped receipts in their respective payments. Why demand kgal 



112 

At church, and tell him in a whining tone, 

That they have done things they should not have done.* 

(All which he knew before, but that's no matter, 

He's pester'd weekly with their pious palter, )t 

Inform him, in their silly, gabbling way, 

That ihey have, like lost muttons, gone astray. 

(" Muttons !" Jehovah cries, when this he hears, 

" Od rabbit 'em, they're asses, wolves, and bears,") 

Invoke the Lamb " that takes away their sins," ;|: 

Beg for dry bread, but long for greasy chins, 

(As if the Lord had nothing else to do 

But bake them bread ! — they'll ask him ne?it to brew ! 

And add by way of rider to their pray'r. 

That he will please to send them better fare.)§ 

Told by the parson whatsoe'er they want, 

If ask'd devoutly for, the Lord will grant, |1 

And thus encouraged, such bold-fac'd humgruffins 

May next beg tea, and toast, and bulter'd muffins ! 



binding while they have such liigh opinions of each other's integrity 
and principles? Is not this indubitable proof, notwithstanding the 
blarney they so liberally bestow upon one another, that they cannot 
be trusted ? Swift says in a letter to Dr. Sheridan, " you should think 
every man a rogue, but not tell him so." 

* The doing of things, andfeaving ot" things undone, forms part of 
the so much admired liturgy, which is held up. by tlie craft, as tl.e fin,- 
est and most sublime con)po.sition that was ever given to a benighted 
world for the edification of enlightened Yahoos. 

i One should suppose the great Jehovah, every Sunday mornin % 
when he awoke, and recollected the day, would call to Gabriel to keep 
the doors and shutters close, that he might not be bored with the hor- 
rible din of the Christian Yahoos, about the Carpenter's son and the 
Ghost. Or say, as Q,uin used to his man, on very gloomy Uiornings. 
"call me to-morrow John." 

t" Oh, Lamb of God, that lakest away the sins of the world." — 
Liturgy. 

§ A little boy, who scarcely evtr tasted anything but dry bread and 
potatoes, repeating his prayers one day, said, " Mammy, niayu'i I a.-k 
GodamigJity for a little bit of cheese to day ?" 

II " And dost promise that when two or three are gathered togethei- 
in thy name, thou wilt grant their requests." Why then do these gulis 
flock in such crowds to their slop shops, and at such an expense and 
loss of time, when they could have whatever they wished for by a litlU> 
gossiping assemblage, in the name of the Lord, at home 1 



113 

Or (heedless of the great Jehovah's trouble,) 
Request some day a dish of squeak and bubble ! 

Oh great Jehovah ! hov/ art thou beset, 
Do not these Yahoos put thee in a sweat 1 
No v/onder thou sboiild'st grieve for having made *em,* 
They've plagued thee ever since the days of Adam. 
Tho' in a horse-pond thou hast soused one litter, 
The present brood seem very little better. 
•Couldst thou not from thy prescience see at first, 
They'd turn out rubbish, being made of dust ?t 
Provok'd to wrath, hov/ often hast thou sworet 
That they should never enter thy street door. 
When did they ever heed thy oaths or threats ? 
Not even while ihey were thy darling pets : 
And shouldst thou send down stairs again a Ghost, 
With Ciijp to mand'em, 'twonid be labor lost. 
Their actions show that Nick's ihfir sov'reign lord ; 
Tiiey neither mind thee, uorthy hoiy word. 
Hadst thou nut twice the patience of poor Job,. 
Thou'dst doir thy golden crown and day-light robe,§ 
Slip on thy thick-soled shoos, and come and kick 'em, 
Or send the angel Gaby down to lick 'em ; 
A good sound drubbing for such mumping scrubs, 
Might chance to cure them of the mulligrubs. 
But if they should not mend by kicks and thumps, 
Clap Lord.Monboddo's tail upon their rumps ;!| 
They'd then be (tails would so improve the breed) 
The " paragon of animals" indeed, — 

* " AuJ it repented the Lord tluit he had made man on the earth, 
iind it grieved him at hid liecut." — Genesis vi. 

t"And ihe Lord God forir.ed ir.an of the dust cf the ground.'*— 
Genesis ii. 

I " Unit) vvhotn I i^ware in my wrailj that tliey should not enter into 
my rest." — Pau'ij .xcv. 

$ " Wi:;i,i!g!.t .13 ;i robe, 

Tlio;i iiast ihyself cL-id."— Fsahu civ. 

ij " Lord Mosiboddo supposed the human race were originally far- 
uislied wiih taii^', which have beeu worn away by their sitting so miieh 
upon the 111. 

10 J 



114 

Such strutting, puff 'd up, self-conceited buzzards, 

Fasting, or lull, still grumbling in their gizzards ; 

Such squabby, tadpole, gut-and-garbage creatures ! 

Some (iho' all boast their angel form and features !) 

With such rotundity of paunch and bottom, 

They'll make the devil jack-weights, when he's got *em : * 

With precious souls, tag, rag, and bobtail, cramm'd ; 

Exulting at the risk of being damn'd If 

Such bloated buffos, boasling immortality, 

Without an atom's weight of rationality. 

Search thro' the universe you'll never trace 

A more ridiculous or vicious race. 

Whatever other planets may possess 

Of living animals, we're left to guess ; 

But none in fifty worlds youM ever find, 

Who were to vice and folly more inclined. t 

And if to Paradise the Yahoos go. 

And I were ask'd to enter, I'd cry No : 

Like the poor Negro, who when tortur'd said,§ 

" Massa, you go to 'ebben when you dead ■ " 



♦ Would not the massive members of the church (as Lord Bjron 
styles ihem.J as well as Alderman Paunch, Lord Gundygut, Lady 
Foulfirkin, and some others of hii^h degree, answer very well for this 
purpose, and turn the Devil's meal-spits round merrily if they were 
tied neck and heels together ! 

t ** So excessive is human vanity," says Lord Bolingbroke, " that 
although it is admitted that nine out of ten are damned, yet immortal- 
ity is the boast, and the risk of hell fire disregarded." 

X '* where to rampant vigor grown, 

Vice chokes up every virtue, where, self-sown, 

The seeds of folly shoot forth rank and bold, 

And every seed brings forth a hundred fold " — Churchill. 

§ The tortures inflicted on these poor creatures, as well as on the 
Caribs and iMaroons, the aborigines of the West India Islands, exceed 
all credibility, and chill the blood by a recital: but Christians, with ihu 
Bible in their iiands, are self justified in committing the most horrible 
barbarities; they are serving the Lord by smiting the heathens, which 
covers and authorizes every species of wickedness and cruelty, and 
stifies every feeling of humanity. Smollett, spea-lving of an insurrec- 
tion of the negro slaves of Jamaica, in the year 1760, says, " after they 
were subdued they were put to death by a variety of tortures. Some 
were hanged, some beheaded, some burned, and some fixed alive up- 
on gibbets. One of these last lived eight days and eighteen hours, 



115 



" Yes, you black dog, I shall." — Oh, very well," 
Poor SHmbo cries, " den me go lib in hell."* 



CONCLUSION. 

Now, who to patients in this curst condition, 
Would ever be adviser or physician ? 
In their derang'd obnoodle-he3.ded slate,t 
Try but to cure them — your reward's their hate. 
Like pigs that in a dirty puddle lie, 
They take delight to wallov/ in their sty ; 
And he who tries to pull them out will get, 
As iEsop's gard'ner did, his finger's bit. 'j; 



suspended under a verlical sun, without being refreshed by one drop 
of water, or receiving ;iny manner ol sustenance. Numbers of these 
poor creatures escaped to the mountains and woods, and i<il!ed ihejn- 
selves in despair." — Historrj of England, vol. v. p. 160. Oh blessed 
and holy Christian slave drivers ! well are ye entitled to u place in 
Abraham's bosom! " Preachee and floggee," that's your sort. There's 
a Christian parson always ready to absolve ye : nothing's required but 
faith in your Messed Redeemer. 

* "In vain you talk to them of shades below, 

They fear no hell but where the Christians go." — De Foe. 

' \ Ohnoodlc-hcadcd ! Impossib'e! What, so wise a race as the Ya- 
hoos! who were 2900 years in finding out- the right way to turn the 
handle of a spoon. It should be obmibilaied, no doubt — the Rhinoce- 
ros, as he was cognominated (to use his own expression^ by Tom 
Davis, would, excepting when he wished to express himself in curt,^ 
have adopted obnubilated, ofFuscated, obutubra'.ed, or some longtailed 
aesquipedale, to denote stupidity. The great doctor's bombast was 
never more happily ridiculed than by Peter Pindar, who says he gives 

" A pyramid's importance to a pin ; 

On ev'ry theme alike his pompous art. 

The gen'ral conflagration, or a . . . ." — Benev. Epistle. 

t *' Now he's a fool who over thinks 
Of meddling with an ass : 

* The doctor's own slang. 



MO 

Religion's frenzy Ivds, 'tis very plain, 

Cantaminated every Y^ahoo's brain.* 

Are Cliesterdcld's inciirabiesf now mended ? 

Oh no! his hospital iy much extended. 

Tho world is one huge Bedlam, there's no doubt, 

A few call'd inside patients — millions out.\ 

Blackmore aflinned that all mankind were niad,§. 

Some slightly so, some worse, some very bad. 

And as in ev'ry class, and. ey'ry station, 

I'here's what pig Johnson [} calls concatenation, 

.^ The more yosj stir, the niovo it stinks, 
/' Im every dirty case." — Tim Bobbin. 

" Society," says the Lauroat, (bL:(ore he smelt the sack,) " may with 
great propriety be compared to an Atss, that kicks those who attempt 
lu relieve it of its hntdeny— Letters fiom Spain. 

And to the same tune sitigs tlie Neio Monthly Magazine. 

" With priests rant and rave about sin. 

With Nick's kitchen urider-groniKi frighten; 

Wit!', mountebanks make the njob grin, 
Do every t!>iiig but enhghten. 

He that aims at eJiiighteuiii^ only ont doles 

All opthalmic drug to a nation of moles." 

* "The history of Christians and of Christianity is a'together, a.-.d 
without exception, a history of madmen and lunacy.' — Ferry's Defence. 

t The ' Hospital of Incurables,' was Lord Chesterfield's classical 
and appropriate denomination of the Corinthiua capitals, a!i;us the 
House of Lords. 

" If you knew what a hopeless and lethargic den of dullness and 
drawling our hospital \s dnnug a debate, and whut a mass of corruption 
in its patients, you would wonder not that I very seldom speak, but 
liiat i ever attempted it." — Lord Byron and his Contemporaries. 

J '• Our world," says Lord Eolingbroke, "seems to be, in many 
respects, the Bedlam of e\ery other system of intelligent creatures.'' 
Philosophical Essays. Of which opinion is also Voltaire. " Lo monde 
nA nn grand Bedlam ou des Fous enchaiueut d'autres Fous." — Fot 
Po^^rri. 

Erasmus hardly excepts any. " Presque tons les hommes," he ob- 
serves, " sont Fous: (a o,uoi bon ce presque? il n'y a pas un seul 
hoaime qui n'extravague de plus d'une maniere:) iis sont done loud 
semblables en ce point VV—Erasrac sur la Folle. 

^ See Sir Richard Blackmore on the Spleen. 

I] " Why, I pray you, is not the pig, and the great, and the huge, all 
one." — Fluellin. 



117 

Connected by some circumstance or other, 

There's no Mad Tom but soon ho iinds a brother. m 

Well, — since the whole's a mass of half-craz'd things, 
Lords, beggars, fools, pickpockets, priests, and kings, 
With non-descripts of all sorts, out of number, 
We'll class them all together as live lumber, 
And recommend it as the wisest thing, 
That they should play ihe fool, and dance and sing ; 
And tho' with hell-fire threatened, if they frisk it, 
Defy Black Jack, and all his imps, and risk it ; 
But if while they were capering and leaping,* 
The old grim rascal should by chance be peeping ; 
Provided with a good strong casting-net, 
What a choice draught of Yahoos he would get ! 
Exulting, no doubt, Blackey then would bawl, 
" Odd zounds and blood ! but here's a glorious haul ! 
Except in war time I but seldom catch 
So many of these shabrags at a batch. 



* Msssrs. Beelzebub and Co. are commissioned by the saints to lay 
violent hands on all the capering tribe whenever they can catcii thein. 
Saint Augustin, a saint of the first class, consigns all such wicked sin- 
ners over to the Old One, sans ceremonie. 'The miserable dancer.' 
exGJaims the ranting Bedlamite, ' knows not that as many paces as ho 
maketh in dancing, so many leufs he maketh in hell.' Another of 
these holy twatllers, Jerome, a saint also of great renown, tells ns that 
'• the very touch of a wanton is worse than tho bite of a mad dog." — 
And does not the great saint of saints, Panl, the head of the gang, and 
favorite spouter of the godly snufiBers, tell ns, that 'it is good for a 
man not to touch a wonian.' — 1 Cor. vii. No wonder the petticoat 
tribes are all so priest-ridden, and dangle so after the parsons every 
where, to whom they always seem ready to lie down before they aro 
asked even to sit A ranting evangelical, preaching upon the te.vt, 
'it is good for a man not to touch a woman,' concluded by saying, 
' and now my beloved, let me remind ye of the sin of inconiinenco, 
which will lead ye to desiruction. Satan's most powerful arms aro 
women; do not damn yourselves for such silly things. Bouare of 
the bottomless pit. B.ecollect the apostle's advice, and touch not a 
woman. 

' All flesh is grass,' 'tis very true ala.-^ ! 
But then a woman's flesh is scurvy grass !' 



118 

One might suppose that I had risen to-day, 
Lniiie Madam Plump, a . . e upwards as they say.* 
Poor Yahoos ! aye, aye, ye may well look glum, 
You're holy water sprinkling 's all a hum. 
No forty parson power can set you free, 
You're Lamb and Pigeon won't bamboozle me ; 
If you think fudge like that can save your bacon, 
You're Johnny-raws, and damnably mistaken ; 
To ray den tinder ground you all must go, 
And shake your trotters in the shades below ;t 
Where, since you're all to capering so inclined. 
Both choice and cheap you'll cat-gut scrapers find. 
Allans done, ragamuffins ! scamper, trot, 
Perhaps you'll find my kitchen rather hot ; 
But pluck up courage, you'll have neighbors' fare, 
You'll meet with millions of your cuinrogues there.; 
For tho' ye're pupped with an immortal soul, 
Nineteen in twenty come to my dark hole ; { 

* Lady Ansicerall. — ' Well, she had good luck to draw Tom Plump 
info wedlock — ?he ris with her a . . e upwards. 

31i3s Neverout. — ' Fie, madam ! what do yon mean V 
Lady Smart.—' O, hW^s, 'tis nothing what we say amoni^ ourselves.' 

Polite Conversation. 

t Since the Devil is allowed by Milton to crack his jokes when his 
cannon balls are knocking the atigels one over the other like ninepLna, 
he may fairly be allowed a little jocularity on the present occasion, 
wlien he has nabbed so many of the Yahoos by a coup-de-maitre. 

" down they fell 

By thousands, angel on archangel roll'd. 

-^ — '■ Satan. beheld their plight, 

And to his mates thus in derision call'd — 

Oh friends, why come not on these victors proud ? 

Ere while they fierce were coming — 

straight they chang'd their minds, 

I'Mew oiF, and^into strange vagaries fell, 

As they would dance; yet for a dance they seem'd 

Somewhat extravagant and wild." — Paradise Lost. 

X Christians do virtually attribute to the devil an empire much mora 
extensive than that of the Supreme Being. Tho latter with difficulty 
saves a few elect, while the former carries off in spite of him the great- 
er p:irt of mankind, who li.<;ten to his destructive temptations rather 
thaii to tlie absokite commamls of God." — Christiunity Unveiletl. 



119 

our ' godlike ' qualities, so much your boast, 
re * all my eye,' when here ye come to roast, 
shovah's made ye, any one may see, 
fot for himself; oh no, ye're made for me."* 

The sooty rascal then, perhaps, might take, 
His passage home across the " level lake," 
And landing with his cargo safe and sound, 
Shoot 'em all in his cellar, under ground ; 
While all his imps would come in troops and sing, 
Long life to Beelzebub, their noble king ! 



* From the immense and countless number of Yahoos' souls (what- 
ever they may be made of) that are daily and hourly arriving with 
passports for the devil's territories, he is certainly justified in makinij 
this assertion, and exulting over the poor lost muttons. The black 
gentleman, no doubt, reads the holy book sometimes, ' pours'amuser,' 
and there finds his boundaries are to be enlarged,* from which he na- 
turally will draw the above inference, and look for his subjects twenty 
or thirty abreast; and not 'en file' througii Sambo's 'narrow paff,' 
which he told his brodder Niggers, 'leadefF to ebbenly moosic, and 
ebbery ting dem like." 

* "Therefore he'.l hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without 
measure." — Isaiah v. 



/L 



THE YAHOO .' a Satirica] Raphsody. By the author of the Gre 
Dragon Cast Out. "The Yahoo is very witty and clever. The f 
tire IS broad, and carries humor farther even than Dean Swift carri' 
it. Its cuts at public men are very clever; and the author is certain 
not a friend to clerical aggressions."--S'm2e?a?/LowrfonZ)is;?a?c/i. 



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